A short time ago, there was a Gus Van Sant retrospective held at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI). I personally find Van Sant’s body of work to be greatly frustrating, as for every work of poetic genius he has crafted (Gerry, Elephant). There is a watered down pile of wank (Finding Forester, To Die For). The film that I was most intrigued about watching at the ACMI season was Van Sant’s first feature ‘Mala Noche’ (Bad Night), a film I had heard a great deal about over the years, but a copy of which I had been unable to procure.

The film, shot in grainy black and white, follows the life of Walt, a working class gay man, who lives in Portland and who scrapes by working at a liquor store. When Walt becomes enthralled with an illegal Mexican immigrant working in the area, his pursuit of the young man leads his life into an interesting direction. I found this film to be a revelation, with a powerful visual style and a thought provoking narrative, particularly in terms of representation of queer identity on the screen. While the character of Walt could not really be deemed as positive representation in any traditional sense. The amazingly paradoxical nature of the lead character, whose racist contempt of the local immigrant workers stands in stark contrast with his fetishisation of them, creates a character who is not always likeable, but who is always powerfully and undeniably real.

Another positive point comes by the way of, that for all his redneck faults, Walt comes across as a surprisingly content character, sure there are moments of angst, but Walt is not some self-loathing, suicidal mess, which was the traditional approach to queer characters in American film of the time. While there are moments in the film that show the depths of Walt’s pathetic nature, i.e. - a scene where he attempts to bargain a monetary price to have sex with the object of his affection, he does so with such an air of frankness, that one can’t help but feel a level of grudging affection for him.

Also, seeing that this film came at the time of full blown AIDS panic and its resulting homophobia, there is no mention of the epidemic, and Walt’s inherent status as an outsider could be just applicable to his poverty as it is to his sexuality. All in all I view ‘Mala Noche’ as a groundbreaking and underrated film. It’s bloody hard to track down, but believe me it’s well worth the effort.