The Mountain King (2000)

Such a frustrating disappointment

For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

An absolute waste of money

It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

The hustler wore the straight guy's clothes, because he wanted to get a new pair, he liked the preppy style and it simply made him happy to get a new outfit. Plus it matched his new watch :) The straight guy had to wear something to return to his hotel. And i also think it made him happy, it left a little "memory" of he guy he just met on the beach.It was a fairly empty island at that time of the year, the hustler got there in the first place with his client, or when he still had some money.He took the boat to return back to New York.He didn't break into the house, his client left him in there when he had to "go back to the city".

I don't agree with the person who wrote the title as "just wow." His comment was written in 2002, unlike what he predicted, neither of the actors become famous. How does that title "mountain king" fit with this movie, I don't understand.There are some questions that can't be answered. In the end, why did the hustler wear the straight guy's clothes, and the straight guy was forced to wear the hustler's clothes, then walk around the beach. And he had to wear a pair of dark purple speedo as his underwear. Does that suggest that he now becomes a hustler himself? Was it an isolated island, so if he ran out of money, he had to do that in order to make some money in order to leave the island? If so, how did he get to island at the first place? Why did the hustler take a boat, where was he heading to? And if the hustler broke into that beach house without permission, where did they get the food to eat for that night? If that hustler was indeed living at a friend's house, why did he leave the stranger alone in his friend's house? Cinematography was good. I especially like the part when they both were dancing with the music, and we can see the silhouette against the beautiful sunset.

I've seen quite a few short films at the Tampa gay and lesbian film festival over the years and most of them tend to blur together in my mind after a year or so.... but this one I remember, and now I guess I'm going to get a hold of the DVD of "Boys to Men" (it's one of the three films featured) in order to see it again. Duncan Tucker went on to write and direct Transamerica and I just saw Paul Dawson in "Shortbus" last week at the festival and he was fantastic, as was the movie !I am always frustrated when people pan a movie because it deals with something outside of their own personal experience. Seduction, lies, manipulation... all words with negative associations, and yet there have been times in my life when a most scuzzy character has opened my mind to possibilities that I hadn't dreamed of.

This little film, which went largely unnoticed in 2001 at most film festivals, is an incredible tour de force. An uptight, middle-class tourist (reading Theodore Dreiser's "An American Tragedy") on a lonely beach is approached by a sleazy, obnoxious hustler. The hustler seduces -- there is no other word for it -- him into the water and then into a luxurious beach house. There, the two lives collide in a tidal wave of sex, excitement, drugs and release. Like the accompanying music (Edvard Grieg's "In the Hall of the Mountain King," from the "Peer Gynt" suite), the film builds to an emotional crescendo that will have you on the edge of your seat. It's almost impossible to describe the emotions. It's just...WOW. The encounter with the dangerous, sleazy, manipulative hustler opens up the frigid tourist, releasing emotion like a volcano. Even when he realizes that things haven't ended up quite as safe as he'd like (abandonment, theft and breaking-and-entering being only some of the things we realize have occurred), the film's final minute is a jaw-dropping visual statement about risking everything in order to gain life. Director Duncan Tucker is someone to watch for in the future! (And so are his two actors -- just incredible!)