Leaving Metropolis (2004) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski)

A handsome, struggling young artist takes a job as a waiter in a Canadian diner. The proprietors of the diner are a young married couple. Gradually, the artist turns the marriage into a love triangle.

Now I'll bet you're thinking he seduces the wife, right?

BUZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!

Wrong.

Leaving Metropolis is probably the Citizen Kane of gay-themed movies set in Winnipeg. The script is a screen adaptation of an acclaimed  1994 play called Poor Superman, which was written by the film's writer/director.

The artist is male but he actually gets the hots for the husband, and this awakens hubby's latent sexual feelings for men. After a couple of weeks and a few erotic paintings of the husband, the two of them are in bed pounding the living santorum out of one another. Also populating the cast are a tranny, a drag queen, someone dying of AIDS, and the usual assortment of types from the movie version of the gay subculture.
Despite what I wrote in that last sentence, Leaving Metropolis isn't really a "gay" film in the sense that if you take away the appearance of all those extraordinary non-traditional types of people, this is just a traditional boring film about a love triangle. You could probably take the same dialogue and make the same film with all straight types, just by changing the names and sexes of the characters and making some minor edits.

NUDITY REPORT

Cherilee Taylor shows her breasts and her bum in some sex scenes.

The title derives from a running theme about Superman which seemed particularly artificial and half-baked. All the characters follow Superman's ongoing adventures, and there is a halfhearted attempt to relate the husband's shaky heterosexuality to the Clark Kent portion of his personality. This is based on something that must have been a current running theme in the comics - something about Clark Kent insisting that Lois must marry him as Clark Kent before he reveals his secret identity as Supes. Unfortunately, that theme was too specific to be audience-friendly. I suppose all of that Superman jazz had been a more developed motif in the play, but it seems irrelevant in the movie, and  it presents quite a stretch to the credulity of the audience members, who are expected to believe that so many of the characters in the story were up to speed on the latest developments in the ongoing Superman soap opera.

(One critic at IMDb noted that the Superman motif had to be expurgated to avoid copyright problems.)

DVD info from Amazon

  • widescreen anamorphic.

That's a minor issue. The key problem in this film is that the tone is not managed well. The film couldn't decide whether it was going for comedy or drama, basically settling for neither. It isn't funny, and it isn't really credible as realism. The tone problems were exacerbated by some of the actors (notably the husband) who were at the furniture commercial level.

The Critics Vote ...

  • No major reviews online.

The People Vote ...

The meaning of the IMDb score: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence equivalent to about three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, comparable to approximately two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, equivalent to about a two star rating from the critics, or a C- from our system. Films rated below five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film - this score is roughly equivalent to one and a half stars from the critics or a D on our scale. (Possibly even less, depending on just how far below five the rating is.

My own guideline: A means the movie is so good it will appeal to you even if you hate the genre. B means the movie is not good enough to win you over if you hate the genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an open mind about this type of film. C means it will only appeal to genre addicts, and has no crossover appeal. (C+ means it has no crossover appeal, but will be considered excellent by genre fans, while C- indicates that it we found it to be a poor movie although genre addicts find it watchable). D means you'll hate it even if you like the genre. E means that you'll hate it even if you love the genre. F means that the film is not only unappealing across-the-board, but technically inept as well. Any film rated C- or better is recommended for fans of that type of film. Any film rated B- or better is recommended for just about anyone. We don't score films below C- that often, because we like movies and we think that most of them have at least a solid niche audience. Now that you know that, you should have serious reservations about any movie below C-.

Based on this description, this is a C-. Barely watchable if you have some interest in a romantic comedy with an underlying gay theme. If that doesn't sound like your cup of tea, avoid this film because it is neither funny nor dramatic, and really has no general appeal.

Return to the Movie House home page