Major body horror…as in, there’s more body than horror

It’s time for homoerotic horror that’s more sex than scares. I take a look at three from the 2000s.

VOODOO ACADEMY (2000)

This is the beginning of the end for David DeCoteau’s credibility as a director of bad horror movies, and the start of his career making softcore gay solo films and marketing them as horror.

There’s this all-boys religious school.

There’s a priest that takes young men, straps them down, slips on latex gloves, and then rubs their bodies with oil.

And, as in all DeCoteau films, there’s a female character that completely fails at her job of masking how gay the movie is. She also turns into a demon near the end of the film.

Point is, this demon woman and priest are performing rituals that turn school boys into voodoo dolls.

Everything else you need to know about Voodoo Academy is easier described with pictures.

Other factoids: One of the boys is the hottie who played the gay cheerleader in Bring It On…the same year this film was released; also, there was a sequel in 2012 which I won’t even bother watching considering DeCoteau’s horror films are purely softcore gay solo films these days. I’ll also confess that because I’m a completist, it’s taking all my willpower to not add the sequel to my collection since I do own the first one and can’t bring myself to part with it.

FLEXING WITH MONTY (2010)

Labeling this one a comedy/drama/horror on imdb is a bit of a stretch, although the stuff that goes on here is horrific at times. This is a trippy-nonsensical-trashy-perverse-exploitation flick that would make Frank Henenlotter and David Cronenberg envious.

Hot-as-hell leading man Trevor Goddard (Mortal Kombat, Deep Rising, Hollywood Vampyr) truly steals the show as an obsessed gym bunny.

He raised and lives with his younger brother, and they have one fucked up relationship. It gets even more complicated when a nun, played by Sally Kirkland, comes into their life.

This film has it all: brotherly incest, flashbacks of incest with grandma, male pregnancy dreams, loads of slapstick, sexual role-playing scenes, Goddard putting his body to good use as a male prostitute (with a homophobic streak), and countless moments of Goddard’s character passing gas…which really spoils the pleasure of his often bare ass being on camera.

Finally, a shocking twist is revealed, there’s a bizarro ritual scene that ends with a dismemberment, and then the credits role.

Watching Trevor Goddard’s sexual antics for 85 minutes alone makes this one highly watchable.

The weirdness factor sweetens the pot, but it would be a stretch to say I liked this film.

THE SECRET PATH (2014)

The Secret Path is a period piece about a gay couple in the 1800s that is being stalked by some sort of demon or devilish creature in the woods. Or are they…?

Their relationship is incredibly romantic – including an erotic scene – and the glimpses of the creature following them in the shadows is truly terrifying, although, the creature may actually only be a figment of one of the men’s nightmares. The couple also robs graves for financial purposes, and those scenes manage to be gruesome and macabre without showing a single detail.

In fact, there is so much potential here for this to be a truly chilling horror film, but it pretty much skips over details to focus completely on atmosphere.

Inevitably, the enticing setup falls into a bizarre rinse and repeat cycle. Meaning, nothing more is established beyond the fact that two gay men in the 1800s are walking through the woods and are possibly being hunted by a creature.

We don’t truly know where these men have been or where they’re going…or why. These are two gay men in the 1800s. Surely there’s more to that story. Are the secret path and the creature following them meant as metaphors for their sexual identities and the fear that society will inevitably catch up with their truth and tear them apart in response? It’s really up for personal interpretation.