A 1999 comedy lampooning the idea of homosexual reform camps with the story of Megan, a God-fearing cheerleader who has never paid her homosexual tendencies any thought until being sent to the True Directions camp. While there, she admits the homosexuality that everyone but her had apparently seen, and falls in love with another of the True Directions members, Graham.The film carved out an unusual niche for itself as what many have identified as a Lighter and Softer version of a John Waters film, combining high camp, dark political comedy and good-natured romanticism under one improbably broad yet tantalizingly candy-colored roof.Not to be confused with But I'm a Cat Person.
Contains examples of:
Abusive Parents: Graham's are the emotionally abusive, neglectful type. They're also economically abusive in threatening to cut her off unless she becomes straight.
Camp Gay: Andre. Although almost every single gay male is some amount of camp, except Larry, one of the 'ex-ex-gay' characters. Arguably the point is to demonstrate just how worthless the camp is. Also because it's funny.
Camp Straight: Jan was just assumed to be lesbian because she has such a strong butch appearance, but she actually likes boys. She leaves the camp when she discovers this.
A Date with Rosie Palms: Megan is explicitly shown doing this, with her hand just out of frame. It can be inferred that Sinead does this too, but differently (the campers are given small tazers that emit small shocks, and you're supposed to shock yourself if you ever have 'impure thoughts.' When Sinead introduced herself, she said she liked pain, and she shocks herself on purpose.)
Deleted Role: The girl in the video described below got her own place in the casting clips at the end of the movie, but of course was cut from the main movie.
Deleted Scene: One of Megan watching a Scare 'Em Straight video of a girl tearfully reciting what lesbianism drove her to, and a shorter one of Megan playing the song she wrote for the others in front of a campfire.
Feminine Women Can Cook: In the video Megan watches on arriving at True Directions, the girl is described as 'rediscovering her femininity' over a shot of her cooking.
Female Gaze: The opening sequence, and then the shots interspersed in the scene of Megan kissing her boyfriend, are basically one long series of this from her perspective. Of course, since the female in question is a lesbian, the shots are of scantily-clad cheerleaders with bouncing breasts and copious Panty Shots.
Good People Have Good Sex: Mary is actually perfectly okay with the students having sex! ...as long as it's heterosexual sex in which the man is dominant and the woman is submissive and there's no foreplay and...
Mary: "When it's time for lovemaking, Dan kisses Sue, and touches her breast. Women often find this sensation pleasurable."
"Foreplay is for sissies! Real men go in, unload, and pull out!"
The Ingenue: Megan, although it's implied that her pureness stems from her lack of attraction to guys and repression of her attraction to girls - while she stays wonderfully kind and optimistic throughout the movie, she becomes a lot less 'pure' in the traditional sense as her relationship with Graham develops.
Innocent Innuendo / Does This Remind You of Anything?: While teaching the girls how to clean, Mary guides Jan in thrusting a vacuum cleaner forwards and backwards while repeating 'in and out and in and out'. She doesn't notice anything unusual about the movement but the other girls sure do. Similarly, Mike works on a car with legs and crotch on full display, also repeating 'in and out'...and then asks the boys "Who wants to go down with me?" Almost all raise their hands.
Intentionally Awkward Name: The gay bar 'Cocksucker'. It's quite amusing to watch the more straight-laced characters trying to force themselves to say it.
Internalized Categorism: Most of the gay characters fall into this at least at some point, but Mike in particular counts, having embraced his status as an 'ex-gay' enough to be working at a camp for turning people straight.
Interrupted Intimacy: Graham's parents found out that she was gay when they walked in on her with her friend. Also, at one point when Megan leaves the bedroom to masturbate after a dream about Graham, she happens upon two of the guys making out.
Irony: If Megan's parents hadn't sent her to the camp, she likely would've gotten married to a man, had children, either never realising her lesbianism due to the justifications she already had in place or eventually realising it but deciding to continue presenting as heterosexual and having a completely miserable life. Because they wanted that life for her, they sent her there, and instead, she thankfully emerged as a happy woman who embraced her lesbianism and who would hopefully have a truly fulfilling life.
Also, the one thing that Megan cites as being evidence above all that she's a 'normal' girl, her being a cheerleader, actually forms the main outlet of her latent attraction to girls.
Lesbian Jock: Jan plays softball. Though in a subversion, she's actually straight.
Lipstick Lesbian: Megan. In the credits they actually have Julie Delpie listed as "Lipstick Lesbian" (the girl at the gay bar.)
Male Gaze: Mike visibly ogling Rocky in his power vest and tight short shorts.
Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: When pressed to find a 'root' for her homosexuality, Megan hesitantly wonders whether the period where her mother was working and her father took care of the house confused her ideas about the proper roles of men and women. It didn't last very long, though, and her parents are otherwise traditional - Mary still leaped on the idea, though.
Richard Moll, who normally plays very scary dudes, is a gruff-but-lovable burly bear.
Pink Girl, Blue Boy: Taken to hilarious extremes, as basically everything is that color for the boys and girls. This includes painting the windows of a car blue.
Rape and Switch: Discussed, but averted - the True Directions staff believe that being molested would cause a girl to turn into a lesbian, but the girl in question is actually straight.
Refuge in Audacity: The film takes ex-gay camps and makes them look as fluffy and inane as possible while playing up every gay stereotype in American culture to ensure that viewers get the message.
Rule of Romantic: The lighting during Megan and Graham's love scene makes...well, pretty much no sense whatsoever, but damn if it isn't very, very pretty.
Sarcasm-Blind: When Megan tries to come up with a cheer celebrating straightness.
Shout Out: The whole film feels a lot like a John Waters movie, and indeed Mink Stole, a member of a group of stock actors Waters usually uses in his films, plays the main character's mother.
Situational Sexuality: Hilary cites attendance at an all girls boarding school as causing her lesbianism and Dolph claims that he turned gay from too many locker-room showers. Of course, it's made clear these explanations make no sense.
Sour Prudes: Graham sees Megan as this initially, but the truth is a lot more complicated.
Straight Gay: Larry, although his brief fight with his boyfriend had him acting less than manly. Otherwise, he almost looks like a survivalist. Dolph is a smaller example of one, being a varsity wrestler.
Teacher's Pet: Although the movie isn't set at school, Hilary fits the personality type and seems to act as one towards the counsellors.
That Came Out Wrong: Near the end of the movie, Joel tries to comfort Andre by telling him he's awesome, but his compliments turn homoerotic pretty quickly.
Joel: You're nice, and clean, and smart, and sexy and firm and luscious and-
Andre: Excuse me. The last thing I need right now is some fruit who's just proved he's straight telling my ass how sexy I am!
Too Kinky to Torture: The girls are given tasers that give small electric shocks, and are supposed to use to zap themselves whenever they have "impure" thoughts. But as Sinead likes pain, so she uses it for something else.
Trans Equals Gay: A big misconception of True Directions, to the point where the 'ungaying' process looks more an attempt to make all of the characters live up to their traditional gender roles more than anything else. This is especially mystifying for Megan, who is femme but gay and Jan, who is butch but straight.
Troubled Sympathetic Bigot: Megan's dad seems to genuinely have her best interests at heart and at times seriously questions whether he's doing the right thing by forcing her to repress her sexuality. He seems to be falling prey to bigotry in the middle of the movie when he agrees with his wife that Megan cannot return home unless she becomes straight, but at the very end of the movie there is a brief shot of the two of them at a meeting for parents of LGBT children, indicating they are trying.
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