MOVIE REVIEW : The Flaws of ‘Companion’ Are Forgivable

The flaws in “Longtime Companion,” which opens the Laguna Beach Festival of Arts’ “Windows Onto an American Landscape” series tonight, have always seemed a little insignificant in light of the movie’s subject.

“Longtime Companion” is about AIDS and the effect the disease has on three gay couples and their constellation of friends. As we watch one after another die during the course of the 1990 film, the cinematic equivocations tend to become secondary. You give the movie some slack because it’s so timely and because you know the story reflects the pain that’s out there.

Director Norman Rene and writer Craig Lucas--the same team now getting accolades for their feature “Prelude to a Kiss”--do have a narrow point of view, and they’ve been criticized for that. With AIDS reaching well beyond the gay community, some have said that “Longtime Companion” is superficial and sacrifices an opportunity to explore the virus’s full consequences.

But the filmmakers don’t deserve that knock; they made the kind of story they wanted to. Besides, by focusing on the impact on homosexuals, the group hardest hit by AIDS in the ‘80s, Rene and Lucas underline how much time has gone by without any substantial progress made to fight the disease. It doesn’t take much to realize that the heartache and sense of futility described in “Longtime Companion” are felt by all who are touched by AIDS.

Perhaps the most amazing fact about “Longtime Companion” is how recently it was released. As early as 1981, reports of a mysterious epidemic among gays was making headlines, but it took nearly 10 years for a major movie on the subject to hit theaters. Even then, it started out as a PBS “American Playhouse” production, and, after being released to movie houses, had trouble finding venues. Many theater owners balked, perhaps worried that the film had limited commercial appeal; or, they may simply have been uneasy about the topic.

Rene and Lucas do let their concern veer to teary sentimentality at several turns in “Longtime Companion,” and their anger over society’s neglect smacks of sermonizing. This is, however, a film that is intended to take drama into the arena of awareness, and the rhetorical sway isn’t anything the movie-makers apologize about.

The men in “Longtime Companion” may seem to belong to a culture far different from what many people are accustomed to, but their tragic circumstances are easily identifiable. Much of that connection comes from the overall quality of the movie’s ensemble acting, particularly Bruce Davison as David, whose devotion to his stricken “longtime companion” Sean (Mark Lamos) is an act of love approaching heroism.

* “Longtime Companion” screens tonight at 6 and 9 p.m. at the Festival Forum Theatre on the Festival of Arts grounds, 650 Laguna Canyon Road, Laguna Beach. Tickets: $4 and $5. Information: (714) 494-1145.