Excellent, a Must See

A Brilliant Conflict

Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Peter Berlin and I'll use the name that he invented for himself rather than the German name he was born with made only a very few films but has remained to this day a legend in the gay porn field. He is that to this day because he brought an artistic flair into a highly specialized field of leather fetishism. I well remember still being in the closet and looking at those ads in Greenwich Village for That Boy and thinking this was the ideal man for us all.As the film shows us even as a senior citizen Berlin lives in San Francisco a figure both of awe that even like Garbo (and the comparison is used in the film) people see him, acknowledge him, but give him a wide berth. He's no boy next door, at least not anyone like him ever lived next door to me.I'm not sure of how he would take the comparison, but a recent biography of John Wayne quotes the man as saying he was just a kid named Duke Morrison from Iowa who lucked out and got into the John Wayne business. So it was with this immigrant kid from Germany who got into the Peter Berlin business.Some gay community icons offer comment and perspective on Peter Berlin, none more than the man himself.

I caught a festival screening of THAT MAN PETER BERLIN with really no knowledge of him or his place in either queer or porn history. I was drawn by the Garbo aspect of his life; basically walking away from a film 'career'(such as it was) and onto the streets of San Francisco, where sightings of him evoke the kind of response one heard about the Swedish Sphynx in New York. Apparently well off financially (or maybe just thrifty) his story is never tipped to the tragic, nor is it ever truly comic. What WAS incredible was to see icons I admire,John Waters and Armistead Maupin, have the same sort of giddiness towards spotting Berlin that I might have towards spotting them(although that doesn't happen in my town). As for the film, the pace moved swiftly and succinctly, and the color of the 70's footage was spectacular. I felt the filmmakers presented the facts, but ultimately lets the viewer judge Peter Berlin and draw our own conclusion; is he crazy, or merely the quaint and eccentric archetype you'd expect to find in San Francisco? Was he ahead of his time, or an aspect of a time we're just re-discovering? The footage of 'vintage' Peter(in that glorious color) interspersed with Peter today were not as jarring or 'Norma Desmond-y' as you might fear,and in that respect the film never fell into either camp celebration or spiteful mockery, which I found refreshing. Considering so many men of Peter's era were lost to the AIDS crisis, THAT MAN is an 'essential': a filmed document of a time in queer history nearly lost. We should be thankful this story has been recorded.

This documentary is a very polished retrospective on a sexual icon of the 60's and 70's, on both coasts. The celebrity interviews are very well done, and the entire picture is extremely well edited to hold the viewer's interest all the way through. A man like Peter Berlin who caught the attention of Andy Warhol and his social circles is certainly a personality worth knowing more about. There's been no one like him since. I saw the film in San Francisco, in a packed theater, with Peter Berlin in person interviewed after the show. All attendees certainly seemed as fascinated by the man as I was, whether or not they agreed with his lifestyle, or the values that he represented -- and still does. I urge you to see this very well done work and judge for yourself.

I might not want to go to a party with Peter Berlin but I really enjoyed hanging out with him for a while. It's a challenging film. It addresses so many issues but ultimately it is about art and narcissism. It's not a gay film. It's a film about making statements and Peter Berlin's happens to deal with his self-image and part of that is his sexuality.The film reminded me that we all define ourselves and that it's good to know yourself. It also reminded me to be in the fully moment and that whatever I think is beautiful is beautiful.Not bad things to be reminded of in my opinion.