The Set

Billed as "the world's first mainstream LGBT film," the 1970 movie version of Roger Ward's novel "The Set" – which Ward co-wrote for the screen – is a throwback to an earlier era in which, it was suggested to audiences, unwary "straight" guys might get sucked into a maelstrom of sexual experimentation (or confusion) if they should starting hanging around with... well, a certain "set." Social set, that is.

Such is the case when red-blooded Australian lad Paul (Sean Myers), stifled by his conservative parents and shocked by a sexual admission from his Italian girlfriend Clara (Amber Rodgers), flees to the big city of Sydney, where he becomes the protege of a designer named Marie (Brenda Senders). Marie's interest in the young man extends beyond her interest in fostering the next generation of cutting-edge designers, however, and the emotional complications that arise send Paul spinning off into the arms of one of Marie's gay colleagues.

But there's another set involved here, as well, and that's an architectural project: A theatrical set for big-name director John L. Fredericks (Michael Charnley), a commission that famed painter (and insatiable, straight Lothario) Mark Bronoski (Denis Doonan) arranges. (To the film's credit, not all the gays are promiscuous; the heterosexuals, meantime, are plenty voracious.)

Paul has style and drive, but he lacks the technical knowledge to pull off the assignment. Enter buff beach boy Tony (Rod Mullinar), an architecture student at university who also happens to be the boyfriend of Paul's cousin Kim (Bronwyn Barber). No one can resist Tony's animal magnetism – not Kim's own mother, the sexually frustrated Peggy (Hazel Phillips); not Paul's new girlfriend, Leigh (Ann Aczel); and certainly not Paul himself (for whom Leigh's status as girlfriend is entirely theoretical, if not for show).

Like that other 1970 gay-themed flick, "The Boys in the Band," the campy elements of this movie compete for our attention, and our contemporary disbelief, with its mix of the sexually apprehensive and the presumptively heteronormative. But there's also a core of genuine sympathy for the characters, who are trying – like anyone – to find love and fulfillment. Director Frank Brittain leans into this truthful element, but he also has some real fun with the film's not-so-unintentionally comedic beats. Not that the drama isn't there; it is, and sometimes it's a little hard-edged. There's a suggestion of male rape, and plenty of what we'd now regard as sexual harassment; there's also a deep streak of dysfunction in the various relationships the film tracks.

But "The Set" fulfills another function, too, one that transcends nostalgia or a reminder of the period's eccentricities and biases. This is a good measuring rod of how far we have come... and the ways in which we haven't made much progress at all.

"The Set" is available for streaming on Prome Video, Vimeo on Demand, Google Play, and Yahoo Movies on February 21, with subsequent availability to follow on Mx Player, Roku, and Amazon Fire TV.