GERONTOPHILIA – a film by Bruce LaBruce – (limited spoilers) ⁓

The opening scene, which could stand alone as a short film, has Désirée (Katie Boland) in an intense make-out session with Lake (Pierre Gabriel Lajoie). While they kiss, she recites the names of women she thinks of as revolutionaries, starting with Lizzie Borden and including the likes of Angela Davis and Bernadine Dorn. But after the usual names don’t work for her, Wynonna Ryder’s name pops out of her mouth and that gets her there. When Lake wonders how Ryder relates to the rest, Désirée tells him: “Shoplifting is always revolutionary.”

One gets the impression that Désirée, whose name might be a reference to Désirée Clary, does not change her list frequently, so her improvisation might foreshadow an impending shift in her worldview.

After Marie (Marie-Hélène Thibault), gets her son Lake (Pier-Gabriel Lajoie) a job in the nursing home where she works, Lake begins a relationship with Melvyn Peabody (Walter Borden). Lake is attracted to older people, and the first time he gives Melvyn a sponge bath is probably the film’s best scene, and brings to mind Lynne Stopkewich‘s movie KISSED.

Marie confronts Lake about his sexual preferences, and shortly afterward falls down the stairs. (Lake playfully teases her by holding the car keys just out of her reach, dangerously close to the unprotected stairwell.) There is no railing and one wonders how that is possible in a building with rental units.

Did Lake intentionally cause Marie to fall down the stairs? Is Lake dangerous? The answer to that is never made clear. Marie could have been much more severely injured, but sustained only a compound fracture. She is conveniently hospitalized for a while, and unable to drive, so Lake is able to use her car to take Mr. Peabody on a road trip.

Re-enter Désirée, the insular revolutionary. She likes to pigeonhole people but often has problems finding the right label for them. She classifies her bookstore-owner boss as a ‘weirdo’, possibly because he is intensely attached to his books and does not loan them to other people. Désirée rejects the notion that books (and by implication the ideas contained in them) must be preserved in their original condition;, without modification. She labels Lake a ‘saint’ because he always seems to be taking care of other people at the expense of his own happiness. Once he reveals his motives to be less than altruistic, she becomes confused. But she does help Lake get Melvyn Peabody out of the nursing home.

As Lake and Melvyn prepare to leave Montreal, Désirée tells him: “I think that what you’re doing, and what you are, is really great. And the fact that you’re acting on it, you know, like it’s revolutionary. All these ideas that people have about aging and beauty and what makes somebody desirable, you’re going against that.” What she says next sounds less supportive. “You’re fighting against nature, and do you see how radical that is?” Désirée seems to have, at least temporarily, given Lake a new label and we don’t learn what that is, but one wonders how she would have reacted had Lake gotten involved with an 82 year old woman. Lake’s sketchbook contains drawings of elderly men and women, so that seems a possibility.

Melvyn and Lake have mostly a good time together, and they make it halfway across Ontario before Melvin dies. Only four people attend the funeral: Désirée, Lake, Mr. Peabody’s son (Hondo Fleming), and Maria. We are told that Maria makes out with Melvyn’s son in front of the casket, raising the possibility that Melvyn could posthumously become Lake’s step-grandfather. Désirée restores Lake to the status of ‘saint’ and actually gives him a ring with that word on it. Whatever he may be, Lake is more useful to her with that description attached.

Melvin never interacts with Marie or Désirée. It is as though the Lake/Melvyn relationship is a separate story that the film’s other primary characters may or may not hear the details of at a later date. In the film’s closing scene, Luke seems scary.

But according to director Bruce LaBruce, he is not. LaBruce told Psychiatry Online Italia: “In Gerontophilia, the old man is already in a kind of over-medicated zombie state in the nursing home, and the young boy tries to bring him back to life. It’s another kind of resurrection. The old man dies in the end from the excitement, but at least he dies happy!” and continues: “…homosexuals were often associated in cinema with a criminal element, largely because they were offered no other alternatives by society. To me, this was often a glamorous, romantic portrayal of misfits, radicals, and even sexual terrorists…For me, homosexuals are now the dead, or undead, or almost dead, the last front against the banality, the conformity, and the relentless ubiquity of heteronormative culture.”

---

GERONTOPHILIA can be streamed on TUBI, and is available on DVD.
In Austria, Switzerland, and Germany the film’s title was shortened to GERON. In Turkey the film is titled ASKIN YASI YOKTUR (Love Has No Age).