Cruising: Controversial Pacino Film is Finally Released on DVD

William Friedkin's 1980 movie Cruising was just re-released in theaters this past weekend for a limited engagement in select cities, and it will be released for the first time ever on DVD on September 18. It stars Al Pacino as Steve Burns, a New York City cop who goes undercover into the underground gay subculture of bars and hangouts to catch a killer. There is a serial killer who has murdered several gay men over the past couple of months, dismembering their bodies and throws their body parts into the ocean. As Pacino's character goes further undercover to offer himself as bait for the killer to come out of hiding, it changes him as a person, and he is not sure how much more of this he can take.

When this movie was first released more than 20 years ago, it created quite a controversy among the gay community who planned protests for the film's release as they felt they were not being portrayed fairly, and they felt that this would add to the homophobia that was already rampant in the country. Since there were no other films on gays or the gay community at large, it was understandable why they would have such a knee jerk reaction to the film. But after all these years, the real controversy of this film is its ambiguous ending which leaves many questions unanswered.

I saw the film just this weekend at the Mann Chinese 6 in Hollywood. I went and saw it right after I saw the hyperkinetic Shoot Em' Dead, and I even paid to see it after I paid for the aforementioned movie. I was hoping to sneak into it, but anyway... I had never seen this movie before, but I was aware of its reputation. Friedkin made this movie after he had made Sorcerer and The Brink's Job, two movies that were the start of his downfall in Hollywood after the tremendous success of The Exorcist and The French Connection. However, like the inappropriately titled Sorcerer, it has since gained a strong cult following on video, and that cult following is bound to keep up with it when it is released on DVD next week.