All Man: The International Male Story

All Man: The International Male Story, dir. Bryan Darling & Jesse Finley Reed, 2022, USA, 84m. 👍

Friday, June 24, 2022, 8:30pm Castro

+Streaming

I’m much more of a “jeans and t-shirt” kind of person than a fashion plate, so the International Male catalogue (almost a magazine, but always with ordering details on every page) wasn’t a major part of my life, but for millions of gay men, especially in small towns far from the coasts, it was a rare glimpse of the possibility of a very different world. It showed muscular, masculine men wearing colorful foofy clothes, including the skimpiest of underwear. It began with the simple premise that “gray suit with a white shirt and a tie” wasn’t the only option for a man who wanted to dress well, but it capitalized on the wave of sexual liberation, too, though without ever directly saying so.

All Man traces the origins of International Male through to its demise in the early 2000s, with interviews with the founder, staff, photographers, and models, interspersed with commentary from present-day queer fashion icons like Carson Cressley and clips from contemporary popular media. It’s well organized, with a clear chronology underpinning the story. I highly recommend it for all audiences, but it is definitely a Must See for anyone who ever kept a couple of International Male catalogues under the mattress for those “private moments.”

• IMDb page • Official website • screens at Outfest July 17, 2022