Restored Director’s Cut of The Doom Generation Screens in Denver for First Time in 28 Years

“Don’t you think sex is totally strange?” Jordan White (James Duvall) dreamily asks Amy Blue (Rose McGowan) while they lie smoking in bed during Gregg Araki’s The Doom Generation.

“I think maybe it’s more powerful than we’d like it to be,” she replies thoughtfully, biting her lip.

For Jordan and Amy, hooking up becomes a highway to both heaven and hell in this incendiary classic of New Queer Cinema from 1995, which starts a week-long revival run at the Sie FilmCenter today, April 21.

Sie artistic director Keith Garcia saw the film during its brief original release. “[I was a] freshman in college, and like all the ‘adult’ movies at the Mayan, I’m sure I snuck in,” he remembers. “I was already a fan of Araki with The Living End and wanted to see how he would do a ‘heterosexual’ movie.”

For the longtime Denver programmer, those years are especially bright ones in cinema history. “I just really look at 1993 to 2003 as this amazing decade of the Sundance independent film that really did so much for so little, before Hollywood started messing up this particular type of film,” he explains. “Doom Generation and Araki’s other entries around this time really shone bright as beacons of queer/punk/camp candy, but the kind that fucks up your mouth when you chew it.”

The second entry in Araki’s breakout “Teenage Apocalypse Trilogy,” Doom Generation explores the bi-curious love triangle our unlikely teenage heroes Jordan and Amy form with bad-boy drifter Xavier Red (Jonathan Schaech) amid a hallucinatory road trip through a featureless L.A. It contains much ultra-violence and boundary-crossing sexual content, which overshadowed its equally compelling artistry and fine performances upon its initial release. Critics walked out at Sundance, and after that, it barely got a proper theatrical run. Then, distributors nervously removed scenes for the home video release.

Araki walked away in disgust, for a long time abandoning hope for a version faithful to his original cut or vision. For decades it stayed that way, until eventually the rights reverted to the director, and he was able to team up with Strand Releasing for the current edition. That remastered director’s cut opens at the Sie this weekend, the only place in metro Denver that you can catch it. It’s the first time theater-goers will see it as it was intended since it premiered at Sundance 28 years ago. Does this tale of disaffected ’90s youth still speak to us?

Garcia fervently believes so. “The struggle to figure out your sexuality and sensuality will always feel like an epic outlaw adventure,” he notes. “And these days, given the dangerous battle we face with conservative bullshit and people who hate people living their real selves because they can’t handle their own real self, it’s probably more interesting now than ever.”

In the tradition of the best road movies, the plot is a sketch animated by the startling reality of the players. Amy and Jordan are making out at the abandoned drive-in when the mysterious Xavier forces his way into their cadaverous Lincoln Continental, escaping from a street fight and bleeding from a fresh knife wound on his upper thigh. He’s a beautiful problem, recalling Terence Stamp in Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Teorema, and it doesn’t take long for him to pull them into his erotic orbit. Like the Stamp character, he’s both angel and devil – a sensual upsetter. One of the best things about Doom Generation is watching Duvall’s sweet, dopey Jordan inch closer to making out with the enigmatic Schaech.

As they careen aimlessly through a seemingly endless night, things go from dark to darker. Every time they buy something, the total comes to $6.66, signs proclaim “Shoplifters Will Be Executed,” and the television babbles about “satanists, homosexuals and other dangerous cults.” The trio also keeps semi-accidentally leaving gruesome murders behind them, in part because everywhere they go, they encounter violent eccentrics who seem to confuse the mercurial Amy with a former lover, someone named “Sunshine” or “Kitten” or “Bambi.”

The youthful, aching performances hold it all together. “In this film we get pure Rose McGowan sass, pure Jonathan Schaech sex appeal and pure James Duvall puppy dog charm,” says Garcia. “None of the dark stuff would work if we didn’t fall in love with these kids at the same time.”

Also worth mentioning are Jim Fealy’s cinematography, Thérèse DuPrez’s production design and Araki’s own formidable editing chops. Throbbing behind everything is a prime cut of ’90s soundtrack, sprawling like a dream Coachella set list from an alternate reality.

Of course, it doesn’t end well. These things never do. Araki’s here to tear your heart out; he wants to teach you something. “Life sucks, and there’s no happy ending,” explains Garcia. “Teenagers in the ’90s – I was one – had so much fear about coming out and dealing with the specter of AIDS. That ending is not what we or any of the characters want, but once you come out the other side…just like becoming an adult, you realize that the hellscape you thought you escaped from, well, it’s just the tip of the iceberg.”

The Doom Generation opens April 21 at the Sie FilmCenter. Get tickets here.