Fire Island

Director Andrew Ahn proficiently handles the numerous plot lines, character conflicts and the tonal shifts between raunch and sweetness.

Near the end of “Fire Island,” Noah asks Will a question you don’t hear too often in romcoms: “What do you want?” Will’s answer is a testament to how effectively this film wears its heart on its sweaty, sticky sleeve. It’s to Ahn and Kim Booster’s credit that they don’t overcomplicate things as so many films of this genre have done. And to be sure, this film is ultimately about memories and good times with the chosen families so many queer people created in lieu of the blood relatives who deserted us when we came out. Unfortunately, he gets far less screen time than the more stereotypically bodied men with their speedos and their six-packs, as if the film is hiding him. “Fire Island” tips its homage-wielding hand early with a verbal and visual shout-out to Pride and Prejudice. After a quick appearance by that novel, narrator Noah ( Joel Kim Booster) quotes its author, Jane Austen, then dismisses her lines as a heteronormative ode to marriage and monogamy. I’m glad someone mentions it, and that the film ruminates on the real and perceived shallow optics inherent in that statement.

Here's how a Jane Austen classic got a landmark queer update in 'Fire Island,' from writer-star Joel Kim Booster.

They’re finally being honest,” said Ahn. “We had to make other concessions, but we wanted that centerpiece of that sequence of the film.” “But the reality is that’s just the beginning.” “I’m so happy that we can now say, as a community, that we have an Asian American Mr. Darcy,” said Ahn. “And Conrad was the only actor that made Joel forget his lines.” “Those early trips were pretty decently reflected in the movie in terms of where we were falling in the strata of the island,” Yang said. Did that person give you a look when you walked into this place, or make a comment about whether or not we belong there?’”

Star and screenwriter Joel Kim Booster and director Andrew Ahn discuss their unapologetically gay take on the Jane Austen classic. Margaret Cho in "Fire ...

I hope that this is just the beginning of the conversation and not the end of it.” “My hope is that people watch ‘Fire Island,’ and it inspires them to understand that their stories are valid and that they can go out there and tell their stories.” What are we eating?’ … Just to see how they let loose, going to tea with them or sitting by the pool, and just sitting around Margaret while she holds court and tells us all of these amazing stories from her decades in the business — I’m so glad we were able to do that on the island.” “I wanted him to be OK with everything that I was asking him to do as a performer, and so he was really, really involved as just a test reader and as a friend early on in the process.” “And it reminded me of [the 2005 film] ‘Pride and Prejudice’ where the camera goes from window to window and everybody’s chatting and debriefing about the day. As he began to revisit the storied courtship of Elizabeth Bennet, a young woman sharing a modest estate with her parents and four sisters, and Fitzwilliam Darcy, an aristocratic landowner, Booster was struck by the comparisons that could be drawn between Austen’s observations about class in 19th-century English society and his own experiences as a gay Asian man in the 21st century.

The long trip to the screen behind "Fire Island," a gay rom-com loosely adapted from Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice," may be more interesting than the ...

Austen adaptations clearly never go out of style, but this latest variation reminds us that alone doesn't mean they pack enough accessories to completely validate the trip. There are also funny throwaway lines scattered along the way, including an overt Austen reference lest anyone have missed the parallels. , who has seemed poised for bigger things since joining "Saturday Night Live," and comic Joel Kim Booster, who is actually the movie's star as well as its writer.

Joel Kim Booster and Bowen Yang star in this sun-splashed love letter to queer spaces, gay male friendship, and the Meat Rack.

The love between friends in Fire Island, particularly Howie and Noah, is much more convincing and more compelling than the romantic love between the movie’s leads that we’re supposed to root for. Fire Island itself is as much a love letter to our best friends, those soulmates who bring joy to our lives, as it is a reminder that these friendships can be fleeting and should be cherished. For LGBTQ people, friendship can be redemptive, nourishing, familial, brave, and loving in ways that are just as valuable as the kind of romantic love that Austen wrote about. Howie and Noah and the Fire Island Bennetts don’t measure highly on that scale, and it gnaws away at them. The stereotypes, the ideas of masculinity, the casual bigotry ingrained in gay male culture, may all be hard to fully feel if you haven’t grown up queer and Asian. That being said, Ahn and Booster translate this unspoken understanding with thoughtfulness, ensuring that you don’t have to fully comprehend their dynamic to easily empathize with it. Altogether, it’s a vulnerable, honest perspective from Booster about the irrationality of gay male desire. Yet it’s rare that these stories, with decades and decades of history, actually become the inspiration for mainstream movies and get the financial backing that comes with it. He’s not looking for a husband, and he’s very much aware of the currency that his abs afford him. Noah doesn’t see long-term potential in Charlie, either, even though Charlie and Will seem purer and kinder than the company they keep. Is the promise of a one-night stand really worth it? And though they say they’re coming over for dinner and how fun that will be, they’ll never show up and can’t be bothered to give an explanation why. The other one will be about the worst.