screen gems

Just what -does- go on behind closed doors at a vampire fraternity?

The Brotherhood

Welcome to Screen Gems, our weekend dive into queer and queer-adjacent titles of the past that deserve a watch or a re-watch.

The Ridiculous: The Brotherhood

Let’s be real for a second. Sometimes we love watching horror movies for the scariness. Other times, we watch for the silliness of it all. How else to explain the genre’s penchant for beautiful women battling monsters and spitting out witty one-liners…or just walking around topless for no reason?

In the 21st century, the queers have also started to get in on the game, and with the apropos amount of ridiculousness. Case in point: The Brotherhood, director David DeCoteau‘s 2001 schlockfest about a homoerotic fraternity of vampires. The plot: Chris (Samuel Page) arrives at the elite Drake University and feels an immediate bond with his roommate, Dan (Josh Hammond). The two attend a party thrown by the rich fraternity DTO, where the handsome leader of the frat, Devon (Bradley Stryker), takes an immediate interest in Chris. Dan and Devon begin to compete for Chris’ allegiance, and Dan uncovers a sinister, supernatural history of DTO.

That’s about it. The Brotherhood features no shortage of shirtless, impossibly pretty men in situations much more akin to movies found on Tumblr rather than in a theatre. That seems to be the point–DeCoteau isn’t so much interested in plot or character development as he is playing with homoerotic frat-boy fantasies. In other words, a fraternity only exists as a front for ritual gay sex and seducing straight boys. Oh, and if you join up with the bad boys, you get to be young and hot forever.

Even in 2001, The Brotherhood didn’t exactly boast cutting-edge technical specs. Viewed 20 years later, the conspicuous lack of diversity–both in terms of ethnicity and body type–doesn’t help matters. Still, for anyone looking for some homoerotic softcore buried in a shallow grave of a plot, The Brotherhood delivers the goods. No doubt DeCoteau and screenwriters Barry L. Levy and Matthew Jason Walsh had a more sexualized version of The Lost Boys in mind. If nothing else, The Brotherhood proves that sometimes, less overt sexual content is more fun than the alternative. So, whether you decide to grab some popcorn or yourself while watching, we recommend doing so with a cocktail nearby. A very tall one.

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