Kevin Langson of the Edge Media Network recently reviewed Big Joy in his article, “SXSW – Damned Good Festival For LGBT Films.”
Part of the Documentary Feature Competition, Big Joy: the Adventures of James Broughton does its subject justice by eliciting the pure joy that unfettered artistic creation and sexuality can be at their best. Stephen Silha and Eric Slade’s portrait of an artist joins the ranks of top notch documentaries about pivotal artists from the sexual revolution. Lawrence Ferlinghetti and George Kuchar, both of whom appear in the film (Kuchar as an interview subject reflecting on a colleague), have had their doc-treatment. It’s time we were reminded of Broughton, the prolific poet, experimental filmmaker, and lover who aptly nicknamed himself ’Big Joy’.
“I believe in ecstasy for everyone,” Broughton asserts at one point; and at a reading he jokes, “When in doubt, twirl.” These lines seem to encapsulate the vibrant personality that the filmmakers bring to life through very articulate commentary from friends of Broughton (seriously, an entire article could be drafted out of interviewee quotes), archival footage that endears him to us, and generous clips from his Bay Area experimental films.
But there is also a paradox at play because, though Broughton’s art was an outpouring of love, indeed a shameless exaltation of love and joyfulness, he himself had eyes that often betrayed sadness to his associates. His intimates recognized a darkness in him that never ceased, perhaps partially stemming from a disapproving mother who docked 25 cents from his allowance every time he acted effeminately. As a contemporary performance artist and admirer puts it, he was “so pioneering at being playful”. It’s an apt reminder that gay men have a long history of using humor to detract from the difficulty of being gay in hostile times.
Broughton had a lot to be cheerful about. His poetry brought him incredible acclaim, and his Chaplin-influenced celluloid experiments played all over. At one point, a film he made while living in England, “The Pleasure Garden“, played at Cannes and could have catapulted his career to another level if he hadn’t “decided to go the poet route”. He was a pivotal figure in the San Francisco Renaissance, which was the predecessor to the Beats (with which he integrated himself). He was alive and active in an invigorating time and place – San Francisco in the ’50s and ’60s, come on! As one friend commented, it was kind of hard not to be a radical then and there.
Back then, the illusive allure of the conventional lifestyle was strong enough that it captured even staunch revolutionaries. Marrying and fathering three children is quite an entanglement for a free-loving poet; and he paid a heavy price, as did his wife Susanna, whose candid interview reveals that she is still not over being abandoned by her true love (the refusal of his offspring to be interviewed also suggests bitterness). The film features back to back interviews with Susanna and Joel, the young lover who replaced her, creating a moral tension that lingers. As one friend put it, choosing Joel made Broughton “re-energized by leaving the inauthentic life”. It meant shrugging off the stigmas of being openly gay and partnered with someone thirty-some years your junior.
A certain beauty resounds in Broughton’s words, “My house is falling down, but let it fall. I go to another,” yet it seems that in applauding his bliss, we are also complicit in a mass betrayal. This is a wonderful moment that summarizes a quagmire that is all too common when homosexuality is pushed underground. Women and children are betrayed, hurt, even traumatized. It is not the primary subject of this film but perhaps one of its most potent.