Head On (1998)
1h 44m | PG-13
Nineteen-year-old Ari confronts both his sexuality and his Greek family. Ari despises his once-beloved parents, former radical activists, for having entombed themselves in insular tradition. Ari is obsessed with gay sex, although he does make an unenthusiastic attempt to satisfy the sister of one of his best friends. While all of this is going on, he's facing problems with his traditional Greek parents, who have no clue about his sexual activities.
Director: Ana Kokkinos
Studio: Head On Productions
Genre: Drama
Video: 720p
Cast
Alex Dimitriades
as Ari
Paul Capsis
as Johnny
Julian Garner
as Sean
Elena Mandalis
as Betty
Tony Nikolakopoulos
as Dimitri
Damien Fotiou
as Joe
Reviews
Alex Dimitriades is "Ari" - a young Greek man whose family emigrated to live in Melbourne, where he is struggling to get job. To kill time, he hangs around with his mates snorting cocaine and - on the quiet - meeting men for casual sex. It's not really a "gay" film; it is a much broader analysis of a young man with neither the roots of his country, nor of a relationship to help him through his rather meaningless existence. His community is trying to straddle their need to honour their homeland traditions whilst adapting to the "tolerances" of their new home - brought to a head by some fairly grisly homophobic behaviour all round in the last twenty minutes or so. Demitriades is fine, as is Paul Capsis as his openly gay/transvestite cousin "Johnny" but the rest of the cast seem there to reinforce the stereotypes and therefore add little to any meaningful dialogue. To be honest, it could be a depiction of any immigrant culture in any country - and falls a bit flat as "Ari" seems ultimately rather deserving of his shallow existence...