In 1993 audiences were shocked at the twist in the final reel of Neil Jordan’s The Crying Game, which told them that all along, unbeknownst to them, they’d been watching a queer love story unfold. IRA member Fergus (Stephen Rea) promises a kidnapped British soldier in his custody that he’ll visit his girlfriend, Dil (Jaye Davidson) in London. When Fergus flees to the city, he seeks her out and so begins a gently unfolding romance. The twist? Dil is a pre-op trans woman, a fact that Fergus (and the audience) discovers when the two get together in the sack, so essentially it sneaks its queerness in the back door.
Spoiler alert! The Crying Game is an unusual queer film in another way, in that its central lovers have a happy ending. In the final scene, Dil asks Fergus why he loves her, and Fergus says: “It’s in my nature”. It ushered in a decade of film that explored the Irish queer sensibility, not always with such a happy ending.
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