October
22, 1999 | Brandon Teena knew what girls like. During the opening
minutes of the mesmerizing Boys Don't Cry, we get a chance to
see Brandon make some smooth moves on young lovelies in Lincoln, Neb.,
circa 1993. And we see how Brandon's escapades angered many hot-tempered
young men. More important, we also see that Brandon Teena really was
Teena Brandon, a young woman.
Late
one night, some seriously irate tough guys - the Nebraska equivalent
of rednecks - follow Teena to the trailer home where she's crashing
with a cousin, Lonny. They want to thwack the cross-dressing Lothario
who's been wooing "their" women. And even Lonny isn't so sure
that his cousin doesn't deserve such treatment. "You're not a boy!"
Lonny screams at Teena. But Teena - who would really rather be addressed
as Brandon, and referred to as "he" or "him" - has
a quick rejoinder: "Then how come they say I'm the best boyfriend
they ever had?"
Boys
Don't Cry is the true-life story of Teena Brandon, a fatally impetuous
small-town misfit whose penchant for "strapping and packing"
- flattening her breasts with an elastic bandage, and stuffing socks
down her pants - brought out the best and worst in the people fooled
by her gender disguise. Even if you know nothing about the actual events
that inspired the screenplay director Kimberly Peirce co-wrote with
Andy Bienen, you can't help feeling right from the get-go, as Brandon
tries to establish a new life by moving to the tiny hamlet of Falls
City, that nothing good will come of such risky behavior. And yet, for
a lot longer than you might expect, there is something oddly exhilarating
about Brandon's unique take on the American Dream of reinventing yourself.
Hilary
Swank's perfect-pitch portrayal of Teena Brandon is the key to the movie's
success as a compelling character study. The filmmakers haven't tried
to "explain" Brandon by attaching labels or passing judgments;
they leave it up to us decide - if indeed we want to decide - whether
she's a lesbian or a transsexual, or whatever. All that Peirce and Bienen
want us to understand is that, regardless of the reason why, Brandon
blissed out on the sheer thrill of successfully passing as someone else.
And Swank enables us to share that thrill - along with experiencing
a few shivery premonitions of danger - by giving a remarkably ingratiating
performance. Truth to tell, Brandon isn't much smarter than the people
who are most angered when they see through her disguise. You could even
make the argument that Brandon is, to a large degree, self-destructively
stupid. But Swank's luminous smile of delight speaks volumes about the
naive joy Brandon takes in being able to play her role so convincingly,
so winningly.
Swank's
exemplary work is complemented by that of her co-star, Chloe Sevigny,
as Lana, a young woman who falls hard for Brandon after "he"
arrives in Falls City, and who remains very much in love even after
she begins to suspect that Brandon isn't quite what "he" seems.
By watching how Lana responds to the shy, soft-spoken Brandon, and seeing
how she's slowly beguiled by "his" gently romantic manner,
we come to better understand just how Brandon captivated the credulous.
That is, we appreciate how, for a small-town woman in Lana's situation,
surrounded by losers like John (Peter Sarsgaard), her violent ex-boyfriend,
and Tom (Brendan Sexton III), John's equally macho buddy, Brandon might
seem like the closest thing to a Prince Charming she'd ever likely encounter.
Boys
Don't Cry ends as it must, with Brandon unmasked, assaulted and,
in a genuinely horrifying climax, brutally murdered. What makes the
movie as a whole so haunting is the clear suggestion in the final scenes
that, given Brandon's addiction to a secret life on the edge, there
really wasn't any other way for things to turn out. Just before one
of Brandon's attackers does his dirty work, he snaps: "You know,
you brought this on yourself." Which, when you think about it,
is just another way of warning that, sometimes, dreams can turn into
nightmares.