The Sunday Sessions

Filmed over a two-year period, Richard Yeagley’s documentary follows a man in a controversial gay-conversion psychological program that allegedly transforms homosexuals into heterosexuals. Viewers expecting outright bigotry and fierce, fundamentalist Bible-pounding may be surprised, as the treatment here is more subtle talking-head stuff, breathing-meditation, role-playing, and subtle manipulation through many self-help courses. Observant Catholic Nathan, who has never had a relationship with a woman (and only two with men), agonizes over reconciling his faith with his urges and he practices rehearsed date-dialogue with a female, undergoes assertiveness training, rages against his mother (the you-really-wanted-a-girl syndrome), and even learns how to handle a gun, in what some will consider caricatures of machismo under the cult-like supervision of Chris Doyle, a "sexual identity affirming" Christian therapist. Even Nathan’s gay hairdresser pal—soon to be excised from Nathan’s life, at Doyle’s insistence— tells him to weather the treatment if it makes him truly happy. Absent any larger cultural/historical context or guest opinions, Yeagley’s film is an intimate emotional experience (reminiscent of early cinema vérité probings by Canada’s Allan King), that finds in Nathan an especially lucid soul who is in pain without any easy, simple solutions. Highly recommended. Aud: C, P. (C. Cassady)