Hustler White

By: Erik Schut
In-House Review - Feb 20 2015

Hustler White, the third opus from Canadian bad-boy director Bruce LaBruce delves into the world of Sunset Strip hooker-boys, gleefully criss-crossing the lines between daring and boring; porn and art; avant-garde satire and obnoxious gross-out. It freaked out audiences at Sundance and Cannes back when it premiered in 1996, that's for sure.

Jurgen Anger (LaBruce) is a prissy German writer doing research for a proposed book. He falls hard for Montgomery "Monti" Ward, a street-wise hustler thug played by Madonna's hunky ex-boy piece Tony Ward. Offering half-hearted homages to such films as Sunset Boulevard and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, the action jerks from this brief outline of a plot to a series of disconnected sexual encounters, whose only commonality is that the sex involves everything except the loving kind.

There's also occasional humor and appearances by some familiar faces (performance artist Ron Athey, porn stars Kevin Kramer, Alex Austin, Bud and Ryan Block). At times the film has a curious lifeless quality, like we're watching a film made by a director who doesn't give a fuck, featuring actors only awkwardly enacting out what they are instructed to do and a plot more interested in shock value. And the film's "romantic" finale will either endear or enrage - that depends solely on your outlook on life.

But any film which infuriates a gay audience and prompts walkouts in droves (most notably during a sex scene involving an amputee and his plunging stump of a leg into a willing partner's gaping asshole) can't be all bad. I almost forgot to mention the head-to-toe duct tape mummification, the old queen who gets fully lashed and bloodily scarred with a straight razor (after serving as a human ashtray), a foot-severing traffic accident, an interracial gang bang, full-on masturbation, auto-asphyxia and cemetery cruising. Did I leave out the short snippet that follows the end credits of a young hottie seated in tight jeans who pisses himself? Yes, watersports enthusiasts - we get to watch his jeans go wet and the river run (if you get my drift). Did I forget to mention that? Oops.

Wildly hot (Ward looks amazing), hard-on inducing, annoying, funny, sweet and vile to the point of making one want to and then immediately take a shower, it's a must.

By: Erik Schut
In-House Review - Feb 20 2015

Additional notes about the director and his films: LaBruce first gained notoriety in the U.S. for Hustler White, his sexy and sleazy docudrama on Sunset Strip male hustlers. His other films include No Skin off My Ass in which the director falls for a baby-faced skinhead, the mockumentary Super 8½: Director's Cut and L.A. Zombie Hardcore. While his works are definitely not for everyone, adventurous filmgoers will find themselves in for a (nasty and delicious) treat.

By: gbelly

By: wilder7

A total waste of time, money and film. I'm stunned that anyone felt compelled to attempt a serious review, and the fact that they did shows that there really is such a thing as trying too hard to be fair. This is too tedious a film to ever aspire to the heights of "offal", in spite of how repulsive the few episodic bits of degradation it contains are.

A long, long, interminable stretch of boredom punctuated by brief moments of disgust. If you watch it you'll never regain your current state of blissful ignorance.

I love good movies. I love good porn. This is neither. No matter who you are, there are at least 100 other movies on here that you would prefer to have spent your time and money on. I'm not a prude. I'm not even particularly "vanilla". This is a sea of nothingness in which, miles apart, there are a couple of bobbing barf bags.

By: Amos Lassen

"HUSTLER WHITE"
A Shocker
Amos Lassen
"Hustler White" (Here TV!) is quite an experience. It is not a movie you will like but it is one you [probably will never forget. There is not much plot (as is typical of Bruce LaBruce films). The story of a German "queen" who is obsessed with a hustler who isn't quite sure if he is or if he isn't gay is what the film is about. Tony Ward (One of Madonna's exes) is Monty, the hustler and LaBruce, himself, plays the German, Jurgen. The scene of the action is Santa Monica Boulevard where johns and their pimps and their entourages play sidebars to Jurgen and Monty.
Let me start by saying this is a very strange film bordering on the bizarre which s too bad because the themes are universal and the plot development hits the nail right on the head. The opening scene is a harbinger of things to come and once you get through the and the gore, you have an interesting film, to say the least. As anti-establishment and anti-everything that LaBruce is, I love his films for their sheer flamboyance. When he makes a movie he throws everything at the audience, sometimes too much so.
LaBruce succeeds as a director but his acting falls short. To put it bluntly the acting in the film is all rather amateurish. The film has plenty of shocks-frontal nudity, graphic S and M, sexual and realistic scenes that are outrageous. This is not a movie for the queasy.
After the foot amputation scene in the very beginning the story just bounces around Hollywood, looking at the way hustlers do business and then moves into the development of the two main characters. I frankly expected a movie like this about the life of street hustlers to be both smutty and gross but I was wrong. Disgusting it is, smutty it is not. This is one of those in your face movies where nothing is left to the imagination. One review I read called the film avant-garde porn which is a flattering way of saying that you will see artistic sex.
Now That I have torn the film apart, I do have some good things to say. Bruce LaBruce loves to shock and he does, but beneath that shock there is a story of the way we live in a hedonistic society. Almost Fellini-like with its menagerie of really strange cast members, "Hustler White" pleases where so many other films do not. It shows the reality and the ugliness of a world that lives for sex in all of its varieties. Some of the film is quite frightening because it makes us confront strange sexual practices that even though we know that they exist we have never actually seen before.
Jurgen's pursuit of Monty is just a cat and mouse game and the film shows us the unimportance of sexual trysts. When sex can be bartered like a pound of potatoes, it loses the meaning that it was originally intended it have.
I hate to Say it for being criticized by my fellow critics but I liked "Hustler White". Its grittiness and realism said a lot to me and I respect innovation. Sure it is flawed but isn't everyone?

By: yawnmower

Various reviewers, who have complained about Writer/Director/Star Bruce LaBruce stealing the opening scene of his amazing little film from 'Sunset Boulevard', don't know the half of it! The clever film-maker pays homage to just about every gay/cult/camp classic around. First and foremost, the sexy, sweet, funny star, Tony Ward, certainly is a 'Joe Dallesandro' for the 90's, and the film is 'Trash', 'Flesh', and 'Heat', all rolled into one. In fact, it's a 'fun' version of any of Paul Morrisey's films for Warhol. This film doesn't take anything seriously, least of all itself. It happily portrays sadism, gang-banging, racism, street hustling, amputees, and accidental mayhem -- you name it. The fact that Mr. LaBruce manages to make all of this light-hearted and funny is a cinematic as well as artistic coup. And how about the major 'theft' in the closing scene? From the greatest of all camp classics, 'Baby Jane', of course. Tony is wrapped up in a blanket on the beach with Bruce at his side. But this time around, Tony is not dying. They declare their love, kiss, and dance up an down the beach together as the camera pans away. Hooray for Hollywood, LaBruce-style!