62 - 120 BPM

Eavesdropping at the Movies

Jose has been obsessed with 120 BPM and was very keen to hear what Mike, who is much younger and not gay, thought of it. Is his obsession due to purely personal reasons – the film seems to reflect a part of his youth – or is the film actually as good as he thinks it is? Is it a niche film or does it have meanings and feelings to communicate to a broader audience? Is the movie really great or is it just something Jose's particularly vulnerable to weeping at the mere thought of? We talk about it in relation to Matthew Lopez’s The Inheritance, currently on at the Young Vic in London. We also discuss the film as ‘director-as-editor’ filmmaking. We agree that despite the film's length - almost the same as Infinity War! - there's not a moment we'd cut. We discuss the opening sequences, all meetings, political actions, and introductions of characters; we agree that the sex scene in the hospital is one of the best ever filmed. Sex and desire in the film is always on the table and we discuss how it takes on different meanings. We also touch on film form but always only as a way of understanding what the film shows in a historical context. Luckily for Jose, Mike liked it and was not sorry he'd bullied him into seeing it. Recorded on 30th April 2018.