An LLGFF patron offers a critique of Don't Go, 'the grittier alternative to The L Word'
‘Do I smell pussy in the air?’ asks Don’t Go’s Bone played by the remarkably muscled and beautiful Skyler Cooper as she watches over her friend Jaden’s (and not yet revealed long lost sister) exercise routine. This could be the generic opening of any number of action movies of varying quality introducing their buff action heroes, except that these characters are women far removed from the glamorous acceptable lesbians who make up the stuff of male fantasy and those who populate the L Word. Indeed Don’t Go is intended as a grittier alternative to the L Word. This introduction to the show perfectly surmises the intentions of its makers to not only give representation to those rarely allowed complicated or developed subjectivity onscreen (non-white, polysexual, unglamorous characters) as well as to reappropriate genres, narratives and language most often gendered masculine in film and television. The fact that Jaden pukes after her strenuous routine at first appears to help undermine what could be an otherwise too heavy-handed reappropriation, however, it becomes clear later on that it is the first seed sown in the show’s examination of complicated and unconventional sexualities and relationships; it later transpires that Jaden is in fact pregnant by her more femme hermaphrodite lover played by Go Fish star Guinevere Turner.
Part of Don’t Go’s challenge to the gender divisions and heterosexual logic of the public domain and its problematising of representation is an interrogation of family – the point of the show is that although people live their lives in these ‘alternative’ ways we don’t see that reflected on screen. The trailer for Don’t Go focuses on the issue of family and its tagline is ‘dare to be family’. We see the effects on non-functioning heterosexual families while the show also stresses the importance of making family bonds outside of traditional models in a way reminiscent of Jennie Livingston’s Paris is Burning. To its credit Don’t Go does more than celebrate alternatives, it also addresses the still present lack of tolerance for such lifestyles with Jaden’s worries for the welfare of the child she and her partner will raise.
Given its best intentions it is a shame the show is let down by some very heavy-handed set-ups (the worst of which is the butch lesbian impregnated by her femme hermaphrodite lover), bad dialogue and inadequate, highly self-conscious acting. Aside from these elemental problems, stylistic choices such as the soundtrack as well as more technical ones like the sound, which could have been bettered in post-production, are less easy to forgive. The opening credits, which continue the reappropriation theme by recalling the familiar credits from shows centred around masculine professions such as the police or the fire service, emphasised even further by the fact that these are characters united by their common living space and not their profession, are of student film standard. Perhaps worst of all are the musical montage sequences that would make even a Baywatch producer blush with shame. Bone’s therapist tells her: ‘You’re an amazing woman and don’t let what happened to you break your spirit’, and one feels this is the shows message to its audience; however, it also makes us want to return the message of encouragement to the show’s makers in the hope that their admirable intentions can be better developed.
- Jelena Milosavljevic