A tender singularity of ample transgression and abiding love, Guido Santi and Tina Mascara’s “Chris & Don: A Love Story” admits in its opening minutes in the words of aged artist Don Bachardy that his relationship that began when he was a teenager with English author Christopher Isherwood, then almost 50, would make heads spin in the present moment, but even more so in the 1950s. Isherwood died in 1986, and Bachardy’s endearing style of storytelling is in a voice distinctly like that of the late Englishman. Among other things, “Chris & Don” demonstrates a side of Los Angeles that clichés do not encompass: the beautiful and strange thrive alongside the gifted and bright. Sometimes they meet, mingle and, less often, engage in improbable love stories that at the very least demonstrate that the heart’s affinities may be vast. The intellectual bohemia of Los Angeles in which they swam is amply portrayed, but the simplicity of their bond and its rich results are the film’s meat. Oh! To be loved and love in turn. “Chris & Don” is modest but swoons close to greatness. 90m. (Ray Pride)
Talking Screens, December 16-22, 2022: "All The Beauty and The Bloodshed" is One of the Year's Finest | "Bardo" is a Small Story Told on an… "Avatar: The Way of Water," "All The Beauty and The Bloodshed," "The Volcano: Rescue From Whakaari" and "Bardo." PLUS: Bresson's "Au Hasard Balthazar," Andersson's "About Endlessless"; FACETS' "Holiday Detour" series; Chicago filmmaker-in-residence Daniel Nearing's "Sister Carrie" with an orchestra at Siskel; "The Thirty-Ninth Christmas Sing-A-Long & Double Feature" at the Music Box and Music Box Of Horrors and Shudder pull…
