Shock to the System:  A Donald Strachey Mystery

USA 2006 91min
Dir: Ron Oliver
Starring: Chad Allen; Sebastian Spence; Michael Woods; Daryl Shuttleworth; Morgan Fairchild; Anne Marie Deluise; Rikki Gagne; Stephen Huszar

Following hot on the heels of the first Donald Strachey film Third Man Out, the charming gay Private Eye-candy is back. This time the plot thickens from the onset. Gorgeous, young, but terrified Paul Hale (Keeso) arranges a clandestine meeting with Strachey (Allen) and flees before he can give him his investigative brief. When Hale dies of an ‘overdose’ a few hours later, Strachey smells a rat and delves deep into Hale’s life. Posing as an ex-soldier who was drummed out of the service for being gay and wants his ‘old life back’, Strachey goes deep undercover, delving into the nefarious and desperate activities of Dr. Trevor Cornell (Woods) at the Phoenix Foundation, the local gay ‘rehabilitation’ centre. But Strachey’s cover is just a little too close to his own story and the unsettling ideas bandied around at the centre begin to penetrate his loving relationship with husband Timmy (Spence).

Well plotted and neatly packaged, Donald Strachey’s second outing is based around an intriguing concept that makes it a more entertaining, fun, diverting and polished film than the first.

JHB     Sun 4 / 6.30pm         Fri 9 / 6.30pm         Sun 11 / 4pm
CT    Fri 9 / 6.30pm         Mon 12 / 7pm         Sun 18 / 4pm