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Great Film overall

Good concept, poorly executed.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

This is my first movie review ever. But I felt I had to, after seeing the 8.0 score, which I felt was surprisingly low. (Oh, I do so hope that that comment does not conflict with the guidelines.)I'm almost 70 years old and have been a long time ally of the LGBTQ+ community. Yet I only recently discovered Quentin Crisp...it was via a TV talk show interview with Tilda Swinton that led me to the movie Orlando, which led to Quentin and, of course, The Naked Civil Servant.What a moving story of this brave man. Occasionally he comes across as pompous, but more importantly he was true to who he was at time when that was very difficult and even dangerous. I gave it a 9 (rather then a 10) only because I don't know that any film can be perfect. Having said that, if I were to score just John Hurt's performance I'd be tempted to call it "Perfection". I must look into more of Hurt's work.

"Do you think a homosexual elephant has a terrible time of it?" Most of us undoubtedly have asked that question at one time or another, but I doubt if any except Quentin Crisp have asked it with such innocent interest. Crisp was, in his own words, an unregenerate degenerate. He was an English homosexual who saw no reason why he shouldn't be who he was. He was effeminate. He dressed flamboyantly, favoring broad-brimmed fedoras and flowing scarves. He wore make-up and hennaed his carefully coifed hair. He was witty but not malicious. He was willing to take people as they were, and saw no reason why he shouldn't expect the same for himself. Says Sting, who wrote a song about Crisp, "Quentin is a hero of mine, someone I know very well. He is gay, and he was gay at a time in history when it was dangerous to be so. He had people beating up on him on a daily basis, largely with the consent of the public. Yet, he continued to be himself." The Naked Civil Servant, with a wonderfully nuanced performance by John Hurt as Crisp, takes us through Crisp's life until he was in his mid-seventies. Crisp died in 1999 when he was 90. Crisp apparently knew his own skin even as a child. As a young man, he tells us with innocent frankness, "I had already discovered for myself one fact of life, the only fact of life I've ever fully understood. I have a message for those who, like me, inhabit a world of make believe...sexual intercourse is a poor substitute for masturbation." That has to be one of the great autobiographical lines in English literature. Crisp is important because he simply would not become what he wasn't. He also seemed to be a remarkably sympathetic person, amusing and perceptive without the burden of seeming to be wise. "Does he love you," a female friend asks about an awkward lover. "You are a woman," Crisp says. "You speak a language I do not understand. If love exists, which is something I wouldn't know, then love is never closing my hand even to the unlovable." He's not only realistic ("The sex was alright in a domestic sort of way, but never share a narrow bed with a wide, single man."), but also practical ("I have discovered a great labor-saving secret. After the first four years, the dust doesn't get any worse."). For a year he was a prostitute. For years he made a small living as a paid model in art classes. "Being a model requires no education, no references and no previous experience. You have only to say 'I do' and you're stuck with it for life...like marriage. I became a naked civil servant." He came to admire America and, at 71, moved permanently to a small bed- sitter in the lower East side. "The great difference between the Americans and the English is that Americans want you to succeed because they feel you may drag them forward with you, while the British want you to fail because they fear you may leave them behind." Fame comes when he writes his autobiography, "The Naked Civil Servant." The book is turned into a British television movie starring John Hurt, which achieves great acclaim. Crisp finds an admiring audience for his wit and for the honesty of his life. When he is accosted by some nasty children because of how he looks, he stares at them and says, "I defy you to do your worst. It can hardly be my worst. Mine has already and often happened to me. You cannot touch me now. I am one of the stately homos of England!" Still, when he enthusiastically agrees to have a movie made about him, he says, "Any film, even the worst, is better than real life." He says it with a smile, but it's an unsettling judgment. I finished the movie with a great deal of admiration for Quentin Crisp. And if anyone doubts that John Hurt is a superb actor, watch Hurt's performance.

The Naked Civil Servant is a TV film based on famous gay wit Quentin Crisp's autobiography. John Hurt gives a characteristically committed, outstanding performance. His Crisp is both a bon vivant and a serious, determined man who, underneath his outrageously camp exterior, is anything but frivolous, flamboyantly using his wit and dress like weapons as a defence to the repressive, smug and specious attacks from the mainstream English establishment and society, which regards his sexuality as criminal and deviant.Hurt's Quentin Crisp is an unlikely crusader, made appealing not only by his inspiring moral force in facing prejudice, abuse and rejection with honesty, courage and an uproarious sense of humour, but by the fact that he never loses his belief in humanity, living his life undaunted and surrounded by friends who he treats with warmth and compassion.Jack Gold's direction is wonderfully theatrical and so suited to Crisp's eccentric world, and the dialogue is incandescent. Nevertheless, the film's narrative, as it ranges over Crisp's long life, is episodic and at times sketchy. Also unnecessarily, Quentin Crisp himself appears in a sort of preface at the beginning of the film.

This was broadcast on American TV (with absolutely no fanfare) on one summer night in the late 1970s. I was just idly switching channels and started watching by accident. It's a movie about Quentin Crisp--a gay man who came out in the 1920s. He introduces the film and then it starts--done in documentary style it traces his life. The first image is of him as a young boy dressed in woman's clothes admiring himself in the mirror. I've never had a desire to wear women's clothes, but being a closeted high school kid when I saw this it had QUITE an effect on me.The film follows his life, how he found others like him and his fame and fortune. It doesn't sugarcoat things--he comes across as vain and pompous sometimes and he is very brutally threatened in one scene. Still it shows how he survived and lived life on his terms. It was liberating--for me at least. Remember--this was the era when "Boys in the Band" was considered an accurate representation of gay life! This was WAY ahead of its time--for TV. I'm shocked that it was even SHOWN on American TV (albeit VERY quietly--and late at night). John Hurt is superb in the title role--he sounds, looks and acts like Crisp did! An excellent TV movie--still relevant today and beautifully done. A 10 all the way.