Gus Van Sant's first movie feels like an unrequited first love; jagged around the edges, tingling with expectation and inevitably, gorgeously, unsatisfying. Titled "Mala Noche (Bad Night)" and based on the autobiographical novel by Oregon's cult novelist Walt Curtis, the film is so unabashedly poignant that each frame seems to tremble with held-back sobs. Could Van Sant have ever been so . . . uncalculating, so vulnerable, so walking-open-wounded. Though shot throughout in raw, unpolished monochrome with lighting so bad the film has bouts of black-out, "Mala Noche" feels awash with color, giddy with the rainbow hues of its emotions.
Made in late 1984 and briefly released in 1985, "Mala Noche" sank into oblivion until resurfacing 21 years later during Director's Week at the Cannes Film Festival. Van Sant said that this was the work he tries to keep coming back to, and indeed fragments of the ghost can be witnessed in almost every one of his films from "Drugstore Cowboy" to "Elephant." There is however, a hard, glittering truth to "Mala Noche" lacking in all the works that followed it, demonstrating that while some things can be recalled, they just can't be repeated.
Set in a nether-district of Portland (Van Sant's favorite city), "Mala Noche" is all about lust and money and being thwarted on both counts. The protagonist is a young, rumpled bartender/shopkeeper named Walt (Tim Streeter) who deals with the city derelicts and scumbags who crowd into his little store from early morning, demanding cigarettes and whiskey. Walt is hail-fellow with everyone in the neighborhood and leads a happy, ambitionless existence until one day Mexican teenager Johnny (Doug Cooeyate) walks in and stands at the counter. Walt immediately falls for this dark vicious-looking boy, obviously having just crossed the border and absolutely broke. Walt turns into a babble-machine, offering the use of his apartment, his car and a basket of hardboiled eggs he sells for breakfast. He gets nowhere since Johnny makes it clear from the get-go that he finds gay men disgusting (pretending to barf on the pavement is his specialty). Unfazed, Walt tries harder and invites Johnny and his stalwart companion Pepper (Ray Monge) over for a vegetarian dinner, cooked by woman friend, Betty (Nyla McCarthy), who chatters about how the boys should "eat better food and take care of yourselves!" Johnny likes Betty, but she's obviously too old for him and the four spend the evening just trying to communicate, which isn't easy since the Mexicans don't speak English and Walt knows only the most rudimentary Spanish. After that, Johnny thaws enough to visit the shop on occasion and accept Walt's gifts of snacks and coffee, while still not saying much except to declare that he will not sleep with Walt. Beside himself with ardor, Walt bumblingly offers cash ("What if I gave you 25 bucks?") and even scales the fire escape in Johnny's fleabag hotel in an attempt to get into his room.