"The Skinny"

This sassy new movie follows the lives of five Brown University graduates who are reuniting for NY’s Gay Pride weekend. They are all African-Americans too as it is after all the handiwork of Patrik-Ian Polk the filmmaker that brought us the unmissable ground-breaking TV series Noah’s Arc. In this latest work he continues the essence of what became to be known as the ‘Black Gay Sex In the City’ but he has added a few preachy parts less we all get complacent about how much fun having lots of sex can be.

These are a group of close-knit friends who are out to have as much fun together as they possibly can. However once the different strands of the plots start to unfold the whole thing unravels a tad creating some confusion and our interest starts to slowly wane.  The main characters themselves are extremely engaging and so we manage to remain in their corner through all the drama of the good and bad sex…. and there seems to be an awful lot of it. Joey’s rather funny lecture to Sebastian about losing his virginity tells you ALL you need to know about anal hygiene, and although it is rather heavy handed at times, the coverage of AIDS awareness is admirable.

Full of hot looking bodies, the backdrop of New York’s Gay Pride, cameo performances from some ex Noah’s Arc cast such as Darryl Stephens and Wilson Cruz, and a great beat-thumping soundtrack (also by the multi-facted Polk, who has written/directed/edited and produced this feature) it is a throughly entertaining piece. Polk also credits himself as the Casting Director too, a job he did exceptionally well with all the main actors turning in terrific performances: Jussie Smollett, Anthony Burrell, Blake Young-Fountain, Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman & Shanika Warren-Markland.

Watch The Skinny now on GagaOOLala.

This article originally appeared on queerguru.