Two 2013 Fest Faves Are Now Available: G.B.F. and STRANGER BY THE LAKE

Now that awards season is in full swing and the studios have their prestige pics playing theaters everywhere, January and February are often a slow time for mainstream films. Unless that is you have interested in naked Zac Efron in THAT AWKARD MOMENT... whose Tomato Meter hovers around 20%! However, if you're looking for a couple good indies, there are two films that were popular on the festival circuit last year that are now available in various forms of commercial release.

G.B.F. is Darren Stein's hysterical high school comedy about a teen gay who a sough-after prized possession, or Gay Best Friend, by the three most popular girls in school. The film is a romp filled with some great one liners and a hilarious performance by Paul Iacono (from MTV's HARD TIMES OF RJ BERGER) with Megan Mullally as his very progressive mom. Also, I'd recommend checking it out in a theatre near you if possible as its fun to see with an audience--their FB page has more info. Or you can stream it on iTunes too.

The other film is about 180 degrees from G.B.F. in terms of content and style but is still a must-see. The French film STRANGER BY THE LAKE, directed by Alain Guiradie, caused a sensation at Cannes last year for it's bold depiction of an all-male cruising area in which some nefarious deeds take place. I caught it at the NY Film Festival and thought it was great. The dialogue is sparse, the scenery is gorgeous, and the sex is serious--this film would actually deserve an NC-17, whereas G.B.F.'s "R" rating still baffles the mind. Anyway, STRANGER is a sexy and atmospheric dramatic thriller that is pure cinema with shades of Hitchcock as well. It's in theaters this week with trailer below.

The MPAA In Another Ratings Controversy With G.B.F.

This week a friend of mine's feature film G.B.F., a new high school comedy by Darren Stein, was given an R rating by the MPAA despite the fact that there are no F-bombs in the film and no nudity. The rating was for "sexual references", most of which you can catch on any TV-14 shows on a given night of television. However, the real reason behind this ratings is the MPAA's long-standing unofficial policy of "Instant R" for any film that has leading characters who happen to be gay. I know this from many industry meetings about feature projects of my own that have struggled with financing due to this situation that has unfortunately been around for decades.

Darren took to Facebook to protest the rating and the MPAA's bias against gay stories and characters. Many people were shocked to hear about it and it started a lively discussion in the comments which has now transferred to Gawker, which picked up the story yesterday with a more detailed dissection of exactly what is and isn't in Darren's film. When compared to most PG-13 high school comedies, G.B.F. seems to warrant that level of rating. Its absurd that a film about teens and meant for teens is not able to be watched by the majority of teens simply because there are gay characters. A similar situation happened with the doc BULLY last year .

Darren has been encouraged to appeal the rating but such an appeal is expensive for an indie film and is also no guarantee of a rating change with the incredibly secretive MPAA. But it would at least send a message that as filmmakers, we are not going to take this sort of discrimination anymore when it comes to the restrictive rating simply because characters are gay or lesbian.