If “Barbie” (and Cormac McCarthy) taught us anything, it’s that few symbols herald straight hypermasculinity quite like horses do. Perhaps that’s why queer cowboy stories have endured in Hollywood — one way to make a love story interesting after all is by making it subversive or forbidden. Luke Gilford’s “National Anthem” sits within that tradition of films.
But it also doesn’t. It’s true that 21-year-old Dylan (a phenomenal Charlie Plummer) has not been raised in an environment that celebrates or is even open to his sexuality. As a poor construction worker in the American Southwest and father figure to his younger brother, Dylan mostly stays quiet and keeps his head down when his mother (Robyn Lively) and co-workers scoff in disgust or make jokes about him being gay.
Although “National Anthem” is indeed a story about star-crossed lovers, it is also, more importantly, a coming-of-age exploration of what it means for a person to find community and a place to belong. It also poignantly asks how much autonomy we have in that pursuit. In it, Dylan is pressured by his mom to take on more work in order to support their cash-strapped family.
He happens to find it at a ranch unlike anything he’s ever seen — a queer community of rodeo performers living together in what seems like an idyllic oasis free from the repressive constraints of the outside world. Almost nothing is said about each person’s sexuality or gender identity — it doesn’t need to be in.