BearCity

To many of us, the subset of the "Gaydom" known as "the Bear community" is a bit of mystery. While the stereotypically desirable gay man is usually thought of as young, shaved/smooth and slim/athletic, it's thought to be the exact opposite in the Bear community. But it is actually a very diverse, welcoming group, and that aspect is accurately and positively portrayed in "Bear City" (2010).

The film focuses on Tyler (Joe Conti), a young NYC twink who is ashamed to admit to his roommate (a flaming but cute Alex DiDio) that he is only attracted to hairy bears ... to the point that he has a running fantasy of being ravished by Santa Claus! He finally gets up the courage to go to a "bear bar," where he meets some friendly, hairy men of all personalities, sizes and shapes, and decides to move into a room that one couple has to rent. Tyler gets over his initial shyness and develops an unrequited crush on popular Roger (Gerald McCullouch, whom some may recognize from an ongoing role in "CSI: Crime Scene Investigations").

The screenwriter also provides mini-dramas involving a couple who are agonizing over whether/how to open up their relationship, and a fat bear who is considering weight loss surgery (even though his partner opposes it.) There is also an ongoing theme of Roger's innate fear of a committed relationship, and the goings-on at an annual gathering known as (you guessed it) "Bear City."

Being somewhat familiar with that world, I felt the film presented a fairly realistic, positive look at the diversity, camaraderie and mutual support within the bear community, though I cringed a bit that it made casual "back room" sex seem to be an integral part of the view. The basic story was a bit simplistic and predictable, although it was carried out admirably by its cast of mostly-new but talented actors, with a few surprise cameos I won't spoil by mentioning. Overall uplifting, very witty and enjoyable, this is a must for "bears" and anyone else curious about what it is all about. Four hairy stars out of five.

Plentiful DVD extras include commentary tracks, jnterview, "making of" documentary, photo gallery and music video. Not rated, but would be an R for sexual content; no frontal nudity. Film won acting and screenplay awards at Los Angeles OUTFEST.

Just finished watching this movie, and we loved it so much. A very sweet, loving story of a community that is rarely represented in film. I love the warmth and acceptance in these characters of all sorts of people, not just bears, but of everyone. It doesn't matter what you look like, you can be loved and accepted if you give people a chance to know the real youl. That's the message from this movie. So much fun to watch, really enjoyed all the eye candy, too. A real honest to goodness romantic comedy! Excellent!

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"The Bear Movement" is to me more a "re-emergence" against social pressure to shave, look civilized, and young driven by the just plain sexiness of masculine hairy men that can't be kept under control for long. Judging from how similar California bears are to Brazilian bears are to Turkish bears are to English bears, it has enormous and wide-spread gay appeal and genetic talent that many ladies seem to enjoy too.

Bear appeal is, as are most things, based on sexual taste. If you see a table full of bears in a restaurant and need to ask what a bear is, you'll never understand. Weight, masculinity, body hair, whiskers, muscle, shaved heads, flattops, etc. are all part of the list of bear features each bear and chaser puts in their own order of woofiness. Why do bears woof? Because they like to, and they also like to growl. Grouch Marx woofs wolfishly at a woman in one of his movies. Again, can't be explained. Why do bears make so many bear puns? A bear is a visual pun at its core. Human bears have a spiritual parallel to ursine bears as well.

And if you watch the trailer () with a cold heart and loins, no worries, bears just aren't your sexual taste, most entertainment is aimed at non-fans -this is only the first feature-length fiction about bears. If BearCity touches you in one or more places, no amount of ursine puns or sexual silliness will spoil your enjoyment of it. Bears like a good laugh, drink, meal, cruise, seduction, sexytime, dance, drive, swim, nap, etc., and have given up trying to make non-fans comfortable with them.

This movie explores veins of bear and gay culture marbled with both credible and surreal situations, and old fashioned sentiments with snarky jokes, all on a non-political island of bearish hotness.

The appeal of this movie was evident as it circled the globe in LGBT film festivals, winning some awards, and sending huge roomfulls of bears into knowing smiles, giggles, and LOLs (I heard more jokes watching the DVD because laughter from theater audiences drowned a lot of them out). The charm of this movie is Langway's cobbling together of strong professional talent with very real and yummy non-professionals. Bear fans would gain plenty of pleasure even with the sound off just looking at all the bears. I call bear-watching "The Lazy [Gay] Man's Fetish".

The extra material on the DVD adds to your appreciation of what went into making BearCity.

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Deemed as the first mainstream cinema "Bear movie" ever, Bear City is both entertaining and very pleasant to the eyes with a colorful cast of characters hairy and hot. The movie is both funny and very serious on topics that "Bears" deal with each day, realationships, love, rejection, dating, and being like for who you really are inside not outside. The two story lines of weight loss and finding love outside of your comfort zone are flawed in many aspects. Accepting yourself involves many things, including being happy being who you are. An option may be getting weight reduction surgery for health reasons for a longer life with the person you love. If you love someone you would want this for that person. The other couple's age difference is hard to phantom even though this is common in gay realationships. The other couple that is married and explores boundaries outside of marriage is more typical of most gay couples. I would recommend this movie for a glimpse into the world of Bears. Hopfully the sequel will present a more realistic story line.

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For the bear scene in Australia, like a lot of places throughout the world, this movie was seen as a major event, long before production on it was even completed. There were regular updates on its progress on facebook and elsewhere, and needless to say, this created A LOT of anticipation about what it would deliver. On release, it did the film festival circuits, and here in Melbourne (and doubtless elsewhere), it featured as a special featured attraction for the local annual bear festival itself. I missed that screening, and had to wait until I purchased it on DVD to see it.

Within the first five minutes I had to remind myself that this was a film made on a very low budget, and I needed to adjust my expectations accordingly. I agree with all the sentiments expressed here about how affirmative it is for bears to have their own movies; we all want to see our lives affirmed on the big (or small) screen rah rah rah! That said, I think it's disappointing when even in a low low budgeted feature like this that some of the scenes are just very poorly acted. The best actors here are the pair playing the couple wanting to revitalise their sex lives, and as others have noted, the best scene is actually the comical three-way between them and another bear. I'm at a loss to explain the woodenness of so much of the other actors throughout the piece. No middling to good acting student would be allowed to get away with this kind of slackness in a typical class exercise, so how it could make it onto the final cut of a feature film is amazing to me.

The other major problem I had with "Bear City" was that for all the fanfare about celebrating the bear world, in the end given the central character is not a bear, it ends up looking like yet another low budgeted film about the adventures of a gay twink. It's like the writers weren't quite brave enough to make a film set entirely within the bear world; they had to tie it back to the twinkey mainstream to try to ensure some interest from that world. I think that's actually sad, and shows a lack of faith in what the bear community is capable of.

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