Plainclothes

Bluesky

Lucas (Tom Blyth) is anxious. It’s little wonder, he’s a cop who spends his days in Syracuse, New York, hanging around a mall as a blue-eyed honeytrap to snare gay men who are cruising. The only snag is that is gay himself, although just about as far back in the closet as he can get. Writer/director Carmen Emmi’s skittish aesthetic, shot by Ethan Palmer, which cuts between Lucas’s life and surveillance-style flashes of his homelife and memories immediately puts us in his headspace – a place of shame, longing and conflict. While his debut narrative feels somewhat undernourished and overfamiliar, he’s got full wattage when it comes to generating mood, even if he overplays the device in places.

This is not some dim and distant past either but 1997 – remember George Michael’s “lewd act” arrest in 1998? – with Lucas’ instructions clear. He’s to give guys the eye but nothing more, lead them to the toilet and wait for them to incriminate themselves. It’s no wonder he doesn’t feel comfortable in his own skin, he’s trying to come to terms with the death of his father and breaking up with his girlfriend at the same time as not upsetting his mother and dealing with his brash homophobic uncle, who has just moved in. There’s plenty of latent homophobia on the force too, with his commander talking dismissively about “the crowd” they're dealing with.

Emmi sticks to the plotting formula after Lucas meets the slightly older sweet-natured Andrew (Russell Tovey) and finds himself arrested by his charms instead of arresting him. Scenes in which the pair hook up pack plenty of heat, with Emmi showing how even the small act of unzipping a jacket can become fully charged. Blyth and Tovey have chemistry to burn and Emmi generates pressure cooker tension as the past and many faces of the present prove to be just a synapse away in the kaleidoscope of Lucas’ mind. Tovey, in particular, works the angles of his character, charming and sympathetic on the one hand, but also looking for a noncommittal lay.

The plot structure proves too unstable to hold the weight of all this, however, with too much development arriving late and in an unwieldy chunk. There’s also a sense of retreading melancholy LGBTQ+ ground that’s been well worked in the past – we’re all familiar with the social attitudes of the time so there needs to be more from in terms of Lucas’ psychology to elevate Plainclothes from the pack. Emmi’s got style, though, and a way with actors that suggests better projects lie ahead.

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