But I'm a Cheerleader (1999) Reviews

When I first saw But I’m a Cheerleader in the early 2000s on either IFC or Sundance, I couldn’t tell you which one honestly, I thought the entire concept was a subversive satirical look at gay panic. The film reminded me of John Waters in many aspects; I held it close to my heart. Then I learned that “pray the gay away” camps were a real thing, and much of the black humor suddenly didn’t seem so damn funny.

So coming back to it after a very long period, I was surprised that some of my opinions had changed about it, but I still find it very hard to laugh at some of the conversion therapy on display. But I’m a Cheerleader does take humorous jabs at gender performance and the flexibility of sexual attraction. The camp trades in antiquated ideas about gender roles and identities, demonstrating how much of what we think about gender roles are enabled, constructed, and enforced by society. It helps that our main character is a good Christian cheerleader, by forcing a girl who seems like the prototypical ideal for a heteronormative lifestyle engage in exercises which make her feel at odds with their goals is a smart choice to underline the satire.

Yet you can’t escape the fact that these camps exist, and what these kids are being forced into is ugly and damaging. Every opportunity is taken and expanded to make it funny, to make it ridiculous and try to take away its power, but in 2014, the GOP in a few states wrote conversion therapy into belief core. Try as the film might to make traditional gender roles and the normalization of heterosexuality into a foreign concept, effectively trying to make it seem as queer as being queer, there’s a bitter aftertaste that lingers. While RuPaul as a camp counselor instructing young boys into becoming a 50s housewife ideal mate is funny, the fact that the assortment of gay males are various stereotypes and nothing more is not.

I haven’t settled my debate about But I’m a Cheerleader. I enjoy that the two main female characters are given agency, complicated motivations, and tender romantic scenes, and that Clea Duvall and Natasha Lyonne brilliantly play them both. But that bitter aftertaste takes away a lot of the enjoyment of the gags, cleverness of the points its making, and leaves me generally confused. It’s a cult film, and I enjoy it mightily, but with a few caveats.