BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

ChanBot i must have seen a different film!!

Matrixiole Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

Helllins It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

Falconeer Mind-blowing colour and rampant symbolism are splattered across the screen in James Bidgood's one-of-a-kind "Pink Narcissus." At a casual glance this milestone film can appear as little more than a series of beautiful, erotic and obscure imagery. But it is much more than that. Model Bobby Kendall portrays a male prostitute, trapped in a surreal hell; an environment that is artificial, manufactured and unnatural. The city outside of his door is even more devoid of nature, or life, with it's zombie-like creatures stumbling around, looking to either buy, or sell sexual favors. The pretty hustler retreats into a surreal, candy-colored fantasy world, where his customers become beautiful storybook heroes; Arabian Sheiks, matadors, Roman Emperors and their slaves. The hustler, being the ultimate narcissist, uses his own idea of beauty when imagining what these characters look like: himself. Kendall is featured in most parts, as slave & master, prince & peasant, etc. His imaginings are realized on-screen in blazing, fantastic color, accompanied by an eclectic and haunting array of music. As each fantasy set piece plays out, a familiar image returns repeatedly; scenes in nature, trees and flowers and living creatures, drenched in sunlight, soaked in rain, an environment that is the polar opposite of the concrete & neon hellhole in which this beautiful man seems to be imprisoned. His fantasies of nature, which are the most beautiful and truly erotic sections of the film, suggest a desire to return to something natural and real, in other words a return to innocence. A scene where Kendall's character is literally penetrating the Earth, by lying on the ground and sticking his penis into the soil, is symbolism that is not that hard to understand. And the dark, apocalyptic climax, where the same ground swallows him into it's underground depths in an inferno of driving rain and thunder, and he finds himself.. back in his pink and gold apartment, as a new customer lets himself inside to be serviced. Does the apartment represent some kind of hell? The great thing about this film is that it raises questions like that, and forces it's audience to think, and to wonder. When a film can accomplish that, it transcends entertainment, and becomes art. "Pink Narcissus" is a film that needs repeated viewings to get the full picture. After being dazzled by it's jaw-dropping imagery the first time around, one can settle into the world, and the mindset of this man whose own physical beauty has alienated him from reality. With a bit of an imagination you will not need LSD to relate to him...

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU The Body. Desire. Dressed. Undressed. But always covered in its central heart with some belt, some veil, a butterfly, or just an angle of the camera. Power supposedly male, masculine, phallic with toreros, bullfights, motorcycles, some kind of master-slave relation that turns into pure sexual slavery. With the Romans, show me your goods and let me be brutal, probably with death at the end. Arabian with many veils, seven or more, dances, pearls and jewels. The Sultan watching, desiring, assessing. It is all pictorial titillation and substitutive contacts with the aforesaid pearls and other objects, veiled at the least even if only in a French letter. Then we can move to the modern bordello, the red light district, quite more explicit and so much explicit that it becomes sickeningly fascinating. The elements, storm, thunder, lightning, rain, day and night are used as representations of desire and satisfaction, pleasure and ecstasy. That Narcissus finds the sex he wants in Baroque choral music and leaves in the shape of penises. His sexual satisfaction is purely mental, inside his soul, substitutive of explicit physical contact. Narcissus finally makes it up into a frontal view revealing himself completely, walking through wind, leaves, litter and multifarious ever changing colors to what appears his goal: the coat hanger of the beginning. The eye can merge with the light. He is back in the bordello area, in his bed, in his pants that he can take off to sleep in front of his mirror and dream of a bowler-hatted, overcoated, umbrellaed, city banking sugar grand daddy who can enter since he has the key but his face is revealed then as that of our Narcissus, dreaming of meeting his only love affair and desired human being, himself. He blows and breaks the mirror. The image disappears and kind of turns into a spider web in nature with a caterpillar crawling along a branch. We are back where we started, minus the moon. "I've grown so lonesome thinking of you." And when that you is yourself, the lonesome feeling is even more self contained if not self-imprisoned.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines, CEGID

sjohntucson Beautiful cinematography, beautiful subject, dreamy homoerotic confection. Makes me almost wish I still did drugs so I could watch it on acid. Given the wonderfully weird & underground feeling, it would have fit in well in the midnight movie scene in the 70's (maybe it did, but I was in Oklahoma at the time & I'm pretty sure it never played there).This is basically just a set of wonderfully choreographed narcissistic fantasies, with lots of searlingly saturated color, glittery, cartoony, piss-elegant sets & props, and a stunning boy who you don't get to see quite enough of, if you know what I mean and I'm sure you do. But you do get to see more than you probably thought you would in a pre-Stonewall movie (OK, technically it's not pre-Stonewall, but it definitely reflects that era more than the post- era).Fundies should probably stay away, as should those looking for plot, action (yeah, I know, but you know what I mean), or dialog; kids whose parents might react violently; guys looking for high-octane boner fuel (this is more like smoldering scented oil than gasoline); and hyper-butch queers who are embarrassed by things like gilded telephones and paste-jeweled goblets. But if you're looking for a gay erotic dream-romp through the senses, get this puppy before it goes out of print!

Funnyboy73 Possibly the most artistic movie I have ever seen. Beautiful Bobby Kendall (where is this guy now??) in a series of self-indulgent fantasies. The 'narcissus' theme carries to the end. And who could blame the guy? An arousing, provoking short film full of sexual, and more importantly, sensual scenes. Not quite hard-core gay, but right up there. Better. Filled with elements which porn lacks - beauty, art and eroticism. The viewer is treated to plenty of teasing shots, where things are actually left to the imagination. Colorful, magical, erotic. Recommended to anyone who wants to view a hot gay film which also asks things of you artistically.