“A CELEBRATION… THE SCREEN SINGS AND MOVES … shows what can be done, not only with pornography as art, but with life too.” – Tom McNamara, San Francisco Phoenix

Newly restored from the original negative in a beautiful 2K scan, Arthur J. Bressan, Jr.’s pioneering gay adult drama, Passing Strangers tells the story of two gay men in San Francisco who meet via a newspaper ad and fall in love. The stunning Robert Adams stars as Robert, the 18 year-old high school senior who is the object of affection for the film’s 28-year old protagonist Tom (Robert Carnagey). Tom’s curly locks and luscious good looks seem to make him irresistible to all — as he spends his time cruising Polk Street, going to the baths and the bars — but when Robert responds to his personal ad in the gay paper, Tom finds himself falling in love. Passing Strangers is most definitely a porn film, but like all of Arthur Bressan’s work, it offers an earnest and deeply engaging gay love story at its core.

Robert’s process of coming out and falling in love provides the perfect elemental gay movie plot — as his lover and mentor, Tom takes him around San Francisco in what even today seems like the dream date of all time. In addition to any number of intimate bedroom sex scenes and jack-off sequences, their adventures include a day-trip to Angel Island for kite-flying and hot outdoor fucking, a bike ride through the city and a day out marching in the actual Gay Freedom Day parade of 1974. Infused with a passionate gay political sensibility, the fabric of the film conveys a visceral impression of gay liberation and the newfound activist freedom of those early post-Stonewall years. The extended sequence at the Pride march also incorporates Bressan’s historic footage of San Francisco’s first official Gay Freedom Day celebration in 1972.

One of only a handful of gay independent feature films of the 1970s, Passing Strangers played at both gay film festivals and gay adult cinemas in 1974 and it won first prize at the San Francisco Erotic Film Festival. The film’s young star, Robert Adams, would go on to co-star in Bressan’s second gay adult feature, Forbidden Letters.

2K digital restoration by Vinegar Syndrome in partnership with The Bressan Project and the Outfest UCLA Legacy Project for Moving Image Preservation. Special thanks to: Joe Rubin, Roe Bressan, Jenni Olson, Todd Wiener, Brendan Lucas.

Two men in San Francisco meet through a personals ad in the paper and fall for each other. Robert is an 18-year-old student, closeted, but hungry for life and love. Tom is 28, and with good looks making him almost irresistible, he spends a lot of time cruising in Polk Street, in bath houses and bars. Fast hookups is what he wants and is used to, but after meeting Robert, unfamiliar feelings arise and he falls in love.

Passing Strangers is definitely a porn film, but still an honest and engaging love story, set in a time before the gay liberation movement. The film also won first prize at the San Francisco Erotic Film Festival in 1974. ~ 2020 Oslo Fusion International Film Festival, Norway