Interior. Leather Bar.

Director William Friedkin’s 1980 film Cruising (starring Al Pacino as an undercover cop investigating a serial killer in the NYC gay leather bar scene) was plagued with controversy and Friedkin was forced to cut 40 minutes of sexually explicit material. Those 40 minutes have never seen the light of day. Filmmakers James Franco and Travis Mathews set out to reimagine what might have transpired in those lost scenes in this intriguing film about the making of a film. The cameras roll as Franco and Mathews assemble a mix of gay and straight men, including Val Lauren in the lead role (Lauren also portrayed the lead in Franco’s biopic of Sal Mineo). What emerges is a portrait of the fascinating dynamics that drive the filmmakers’ need to challenge normalcy, the interplay of celebrity and experimentation, and the dilemma faced by actors struggling to reconcile who they are with the idea of performing in a sexually explicit, gay S&M film. Franco and Mathews’ reimagining of the lost 40 minutes from Cruising is a starting point to a broader exploration of sexual and creative freedom.

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