Tango y Cash

Tango and Cash is an obviously fragmented project whose disparate segments, shot by different directors, were eventually patched together by Hollywood’s leading Dr. Frankenstein, Stuart Baird. The result is a pastiche in the sense of a mixture of influences and motifs, but also as a patchwork of different creative and production intentions. This is most evident in the ending, which was shot entirely by a different director and turns the hitherto relatively down-to-earth buddy movie into a bombastic and, at the same time, completely tasteless action extravaganza, mixing dime-a-dozen clichés and a Bond-esque villain’s lair with a juvenile phantasmagorical car chase like something from the later instalments of Fast & Furious. The film’s disjointedness is apparent not only on the level of style, but also in its unclear and blended orientation. Tango & Cash is unique in the way it reinforces toxic machismo and materialises the wet dreams of fascist cops, while also managing to be openly queer. The top bombastically masculine action movies of the 1980s either very unconvincingly diluted their homoerotic storylines with dysfunctional hetero motifs (Top Gun) or blatantly highlighted them (Commando). On the one hand, Tango & Cash waves the conservative banner by making light of police brutality, celebrating frontier justice outside the confines of the law, mocking the rehabilitation of prisoners and even letting cops dream about a division developing paramilitary technology (which seems tragicomic at a time when American police departments are buying surplus from the military). But at the same time, a camp thread of gradually removed clothes, cross-dressing and symbolic and literal comparison of dick sizes is woven through the film, and that’s not even to mention the supporting interpretation of the whole film as a story of a cautious coming-out in the hypermacho environment of the police department. ____ QUEER SPOILERS FOLLOW ____ If we expand on the dynamic between the titular duo, the straitlaced Tango emerges as a closeted gay hiding behind the buttoned-down façade of the uniform. His tragic storyline consists in the fact that, because of his fear of the reactions of those around him, he is unable to express his affection for Cash, who, with his open physicality, animalism and, mainly, confident fluid sexuality, is Tango’s direct opposite. Cash uninhibitedly undresses with other men in the elevator and puts on women’s clothes and stays in them without losing his own identity. Tango, on the other hand, pleadingly keeps up appearances even in the showers, though he simultaneously lets it slip that he had been eying Cash (in fact, the shower dialogue also suggests that Tango got aroused when Cash first tells him he’s a “peewee”, but soon refers to him as being “three-legged”). Peculiarly, Tango loosens up and lets it all hang out in a prison filled with oiled-up mastodons and permeated with promises of homosexual romps. It is no coincidence that there is dialogue about Tango’s lack of a “wardrobe” in prison. It is no wonder that when Tango is obviously pleased that he has established a homo dynamic with his cellmate, he is in no way inclined to take part in the proposed escape. He decides to go through with it only when he starts to miss Cash. Outside of prison, their paths diverge again at first, but as is said, they will always remember their time together behind bars. Their relationship becomes complicated when Tango starts to think Cash is straight and slept with his sister Kiki. Instead of the usual resolution in macho films, where he would punch his colleague in the mouth or simply give him his blessing, Tango, tormented by both his love for his sibling and his concealed gay love, only desperately tries to find out what really happened. Kiki and Cash, who clearly see right through Tango, are both amused by this and take the opportunity to tease him. Through the various twists in the two protagonists’ gradual coming together and synchronisation, we then come to the climax, in which the typical macho gamesmanship is repeated at first. But Kiki cuts that short with the line: “Why don’t you guys just admit it that you work well together?”, and then, after a cautious but eloquent confession, followed by a happy ending confirmed by the firm physical joining of the two protagonists (the suggestion of a bisexual threesome with a hint of incest is also offered up, but that would be too progressive for Hollywood). The camp dimension of the whole film is multiplied by the fact that the conservative Stallone is clearly unaware that he is playing a gay character, whereas the libertarian buffoon Russell plays his queer scamp with knowing verve. Of course, all of the above is just one possible interpretation, but it makes the film much more enjoyable. (28.09.2021) (menos) (más)