Night Stage review: Erotic gay thriller from Brazil in which straight men steal the show

“I hate when gay men are depicted in films as awful people,” I said, triggered, upon leaving the closing night screening of Night Stage at this year’s BFI Flare: London LGBT Film Festival. “You mean like real life?” my (gay and male) companion countered, half-joking, electrified by what he’d just seen on-screen.

For sure, there is something thrillingly erotic about an erotic thriller in which the central characters’ overwhelming fixation with gay sex – in this case, dangerous sex in public – overrides all consideration for others, and indeed common sense itself. And in an era where our community so often responds to unprecedented queerphobia by, somewhat understandably, pushing the great, good and seemingly perfect forward in art and in life, it is refreshing when at least one faction is represented, without apology, as it really is, in all its grimy glory.

The problem with Night Stage, however, is that it face plants in its final frames. Actor Matias (Gabriel Faryas) and politician Rafael (Cirillo Luna), both in cracked glass closets due to their rapidly rising public profiles, risk it all for what we’re meant to believe is the purest sexual thrill of their lives. The set of circumstances arousing them in that moment, however, are so ridiculous – albeit, original! – that it forces a reevaluation of all that went before. Particularly the repetition of corny “oh shit!”-style scrambling every time a light goes on and someone nearly catches them mid-clinch.

On the one hand, this farcical steaminess has its charm, à la Danielle Steel, or the brilliantly absurd blue novels I read as a teenager. It’s just this film works better when in a gear of intoxicating seriousness, à la David Cronenberg’s unflinching examination of kink in 1996 masterpiece Crash. For indeed, there’s plenty to love about the noirish Night Stage: first and foremost, its deliciously pulpy atmosphere, achieved through unerring commitment to clever use of neon light and shadow, plus inspired narrative hooks such as when Rafael and another theatre actor, Fabio (Henrique Barreira) jostle on a ledge to decide who delivers that night’s closing monologue.

Another scene in which Matias and Fabio, rehearsing, read the same material in wildly different emotional keys really allows the actors to flex their muscles. Barreira is a particularly vivid presence during the stage and fight scenes, and the highlight of the movie for me is a small detail late in the film in which a dejected Fabio cooks yet another frozen pizza. Barreira may be a super-hunk, but Fabio’s hunched body language – the sight of him trudging around his kitchen – is gut-wrenchingly sad, and again evidence of the emotional heft the film frequently plays with before knowingly discarding it in pursuit of something else.

The role of Fabio – a gay-friendly straight guy whose descent into villain territory has nothing to do with homophobia – is a well-written gem, as is Camilo, Rafael’s sketchy, presumably straight bodyguard, whose true motivations remain maddeningly unclear. (Ivo Müller is truly menacing here.) As for the gay characters… if Matias and Rafael’s conduct seems far-fetched, even by the worst of Grindr’s standards, then rest assured the chemistry between Faryas and Luna is off the scale. They take the prize for the most animated snogging I’ve ever seen in a film, hands down.