By Nicole Maria Winkler For Metal Magazine Issue No. 40, Autumn/winter 2018

MY OWN PRIVATE IDAHO (1991) dir. Gus Van Sant

The centerpiece of River’s performance, and the film, is a campfire scene with Reeves. Scott Favor takes Mike Waters on a road trip (on a stolen motorcycle) to visit Mike’s brother. At night, sitting by a fire they’ve made, they discuss their respective childhoods: “If I had a normal family and a good upbringing, then I would have been a well-adjusted person,” Mike insists. What’s really on his mind: he’s in love with Scott, and he’s terrified of saying so.

 “I only have sex with a guy for money,” a reclining Scott tells him. “Two guys can’t love each other.”

 A miserable Mike says haltingly, “I could love someone even if I, you know, wasn’t paid for it. And I love you, and you don’t pay me.” Curling up in a ball, he tells Scott, “I really want to kiss you, man.” The scene ends with Scott gently holding Mike, stroking his hair.

“This is the best part in the film,” Van Sant said, “and was chosen by River to be his big scene.” At River’s request, Van Sant scheduled it for the last day of shooting. River rewrote it himself, making it more lyrical and making his love for Scott explicit (in Van Sant’s original script, the relationship was more ambiguous).

 “‘I love you, and you don’t have to pay me’—I’m so glad I wrote that line,” River said. “I think that in his private life, Mike was probably a virgin, so he only relates sex with work.” River had spent some time thinking about situational virginity, and the emotional consequences of having sex when you didn’t want to have it.

— Last Night at the Viper Room: River Phoenix and the Hollywood he left behind by Gavin Edwards

FILM NOIR WOMEN WITH GUNS (pt. 1 & pt. 2)

Barbara Stanwyck, Double Indemnity (1944) dir. Billy Wilder Teresa Wright, Pursued (1947) dir. Raoul Walsh Rita Hayworth, The Lady from Shanghai (1947) dir. Orson Welles Jane Greer, The Big Steal (1949) dir. Don Siegel Joan Leslie, Repeat Performance (1947) dir. Alfred L. Werker Joan Crawford, Flamingo Road (1949) dir. Michael Curtiz Lizabeth Scott, Too Late for Tears (1949) dir. Byron Haskin Gloria Grahame, The Big Heat (1953) dir. Fritz Lang

Grace Jones at her baby shower with Andy Warhol, Debbie Harry, Antonio Lope and Stephanie Mills at Paradise Garage in New York City on September 24, 1979.

Photos by Jake Wynter

DREW STARKEY & DANIEL CRAIG Queer (2024) dir. Luca Guadagnino

Federico Gama, selection from 12-D, 2007

a field of california lilac (saship or ba-kam’ kǎ-lǐ’) living on the black mountain preserve, taken by michelle duong

liberal political parties will be like "you believe in having principles? that pales in comparison to my strategy, running an effective and competent electoral campaign and appealing to voters" and then run a dog shit political campaign that nobody likes

Urban Canopy ~ Hong Kong by Christophe Caudroy ⌘ Elevated highways float above surviving woodland