All the Rage
All the Rage
| 11 June 1997 (USA)
All the Rage Trailers

ALL THE RAGE takes a satirical and poignant look at one gay man's obsessive pursuit of physical, sexual, and romantic perfection. Christopher Bedford is everyone's fantasy. He's gorgeous, young, clever, rich, and above all, totally buffed and every boy in Boston seems to want him. At thirty-one, he's gliding through life, celebrating himself as the 90's gay playboy ideal, without ever realizing what a mess he's become.

Reviews
Diagonaldi Very well executed
SpuffyWeb Sadly Over-hyped
Skyler Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.
Cheryl A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.
jmorris236 I wanted to like this movie. I ordered the DVD hoping it was a controversial satire on the superficiality of the gay ghetto, as promised. What I got was a mildly amusing comedy, with nowhere near as much punch as I expected from the premise.There were problems immediately. Although he has a perfect body, John-Michael Lander as Christopher portrays a character who is so unlikable, it's not possible to warm to him at all, let alone develop an interest in what happens to him as the plot progresses. Some may find him irresistibly attractive, but frankly I wouldn't have given him a second glance no matter how much he masked what a creep he is – perfect abs and all. A bigger problem to me was the character played by David Vincent. The film's premise – the brunt of the "hard-hitting satire" - is the fact that Christopher's boyfriend is supposed to be the opposite of what we've been "conditioned" to find attractive because (gasp!) he doesn't work out in a gym and actually has love handles (horrors!). He also doesn't have a glamorous job (I mean, really, who knows any gay men like that?) and – now here's the most shocking thing I could imagine in a satire on gay values – he sleeps in PAJAMAS! Now I know a few guys in Chelsea who might find this impossible to believe, but despite the love handles and the pajamas, the "out-of-shape, chunky, under-employed geek" turns out to be the most attractive man in the whole film. Somehow I think that some of the people this film was intended for won't quite get that.I liked what this picture was trying to say – Christopher is shallow, superficial, vain and annoying, and more or less gets what he deserves in the end. It's not his promiscuity that bothers us, but the way he treats his conquests, refusing to ever have a second date, and finding the most ridiculous faults imaginable in each potential suitor. But the telling of the tale just isn't very interesting, or very funny, and if they really wanted to make it a satire, it should have been far more merciless to maintain my interest.Maybe I'm just old enough to remember when gay men didn't spend all their time in a gym, staring at the mirror to confirm their own beauty. I seem to recall that when I first came out in the early 70's, gym bunnies were few and far between in the gay male community. In those days, you were either skinny, fat or average, and if people judged you by your looks, it was solely on the basis of whether or not you had a pretty face. The main things we used back then to attract people were wit, charm, personality and intelligence, along with keeping ourselves reasonably well groomed. Now all I hear and see everywhere is stats, stats and more stats – numbers for waists, chests, arms, and thighs, together with demands that everyone have a perfect body, perfect clothes and a perfect career, or forget it. I was hoping that this film might raise some serious objections to such values, but when the final credits were rolling I felt I hadn't really seen or heard very much to either provoke meaningful discussion or challenge these attitudes, which is what I expect a good satire to do. Some may find it quite enjoyable, and feel it delivers on its promises, but I was less than satisfied when it was over.
fwright This movie is one of the very best and most vicious satires that I've ever seen. Unfortunately, not many people will appreciate it because the satire can only be understood by a gay audience and gay men typically have little or no sense of humor. Unless it involves smirky or catty lines about how someone is dressed.On the unlikely chance that you are a gay male who does have a sense of humor and understands satire, please see this movie!! My boyfriend and I saw it at Kendall Square Cinema on opening night and howled with laughter all the way through -- while everyone else sat in stony silence. This movie skewers the pretentious and empty lifestyles of life in Boston's South End, one of America's largest gay neighborhoods. And while the acting is terrible, truly terrible, the writing and direction are first rate.
iago-6 This movie IS poorly acted and put together, but it's unique in its subject matter, and I think that makes it worth seeing.This is supposedly a satire of the shallowness of certain types of gays (they're called "twinks," "Gym Bunnies" and "Chelsea Boys" where I am) who are rich, overly groomed and superficial. It follows one guy, a shallow heartbreaker, as he falls in love with someone not of his "class."A HUGE problem is the acting. I felt that a lot of the lines would have been funny if the actors could have sold them well. With a satire like this, the actors need to go at lines like "Are you telling me you dated someone who doesn't work out?" with absolutre sincerity, but what we get is a sort of "I'm just an actor, I'm not really like this, see" kind of irony. It kills the entire script. Lines that were funny when I read them in a review are absolutely flat on screen. One gets the impression the director asked his friends to be in the movie, and the result is the slightly embarrassed feeling of watching community theater.Thematically, the movie is VERY tame. It doesn't really go far in satirizing its characters, and ends up in some ways reinforcing their viewpoints. A character who is not rich and doesn't work out is seen as SO DIFFERENT it's SHOCKING that our main character would even BE SEEN with him! So much for embracing diversity, huh? Near the end our protagonist is upbraided for not calling a guy when he said he would and basically being a playboy. Since when is this a crime in gay circles? Did he say he was a virgin and that they would be married? The effect one leaves the theater with is oe of those superficial types saying (and we've all heard it) "Oh I'm so superficial, it's awful" when you know they don't really mean it and won't change. I was curious to see WHO would go to see this movie, and was disappointed to see it's the very audience the movie pretends to criticize. They seemed absolutely unfazed.But the fact that this movie DOES examine these attitudes at all I think makes it worth a viewing. It's one of those that's better to talk about than to sit through. And, if you're attracted to those kinds of hairless chiseled body types, there is ample chest on display... though if you're seeing the film for that reason, anything it has to say, I suspect, would be irrelevant to you.--- Check out website devoted to bad, cheesy and gay movies: www.cinemademerde.com
perdita-3 What an amateurish movie. The acting was uniformly stiff and annoying, and the background music was appalling. This movie benefitted from the current vogue for Indy/Gay Cinema, and had it been a movie about a straight cad, it would not have warranted any attention. Moreover, it would be skewered by critics everywhere, and for very valid reasons. I support gay and independent cinema, but not at the expense of credibility. My gay friend and I were happy we saw this movie, if only to repeat its wooden lines and chuckle. This movie is an embarrassment.