William Henderson: Would’ve spent more than a weekend with “Weekend”

A one-night stand that turns into something more.

When I heard the premise for the just-out movie, Weekend, I was jealous, mostly because I wish I had thought of the A one-night stand that turns into something more tagline. And then I watched the movie, and I was all-the-way jealous for the way in which Andrew Haigh depicts the way in which two people can come together, even if for a short period of time.

You want to know the story behind the premise don’t you. The tagline not hooky enough for you? Fine. Russell, a stoner lifeguard, has a meet-cute with Glen, an artist with a tendency to interview his lovers after they are done fucking. What follows next is a weekend the two spend together, talking and laughing and making tea and going out and using drugs and probably more fucking, though we are not privy to the more-fucking part of their weekend, at least we’re not privy to much of the more-fucking part of their weekend.

The men appear to be headed toward something resembling a relationship – because, let’s face it, relationships can form after an intense date or conversation or conversation masquerading as a date or date masquerading as conversation – but the men cannot head toward something resembling a relationship because –

Do you think I’d actually tell you?

Coincidentally, I saw Weekend the first time with a man who had come to visit me from Montreal. He and I were having our own “weekend,” as it were. Then he left, and the weekend was over.

The second time I saw Weekend, I was alone, and the moments I remembered as particularly poignant the first go-around seemed less so, knowing what I knew, and the moments that didn’t seem much the first go-around sparkled (I use this word only because any review of a movie that depicts gay sex should use the word sparkle).

And then I let the movie percolate, knowing I was reviewing the movie, and I let the movie percolate and steep and grow cold and then my electronic footprint crossed the electronic footprint of a man named Rob, who had just seen Weekend. He thinks the movie depressing; I do not.

And we talked about the movie, using words like cynical and poignant and phrases like wouldn’t it be nice if and there was the promise of something more that some other factor cut short.

And we kept talking, lost past the point when we were talking about Weekend.

Which I think is my longwinded way of saying that movies and books and music and other pieces of ephemeral can connect us and bring us together, much like Russell and Glen connect and, even if just for a little while, get to know each other. What kind of music you like and the books on your bookshelves and even how you feel about a movie I love – all of these factors will help me decide what kind of person you are, and, if I decide you’re not much of a person, then I’m not going to have much interest in you proving me wrong. But if I decide that we were secretly split apart at birth (NIDYA!), then a weekend isn’t long enough to figure out what we have in common and what new experience(s) we can share.