Internationally renowned for his fashion photography which has graced the covers of magazines like Vogue and Vanity Fair, Bruce Weber first turned his attention to film with "Broken Noses", (1987) a documentary about boxer Andy Minsker, and "Let's Get Lost" (1988), about wild man jazz-trumpeter Chet Baker.
"Chop Suey" starts as yet another biographical-documentary, about Weber's current favourite male model Peter Johnson. But this time, instead of concentrating only on his subject, Weber takes the film in random directions, turning the film into a jazz-style selection of improvisational riffs that encompass vignettes about lesbian cabaret singer Frances Faye, stories about Hollywood stars like Frank Sinatra and Robert Mitchum, as well as a family of extreme-surfers and Liz Taylor's 'bodyguard'.
It's an eclectic film, held together only by Weber's ironic voice-over narration and the endless shots of the beautiful Johnson, who doesn't have much to contribute to the meetings with various celebrities that Weber sets up other than a few "wows" or blank expressions.
Weber's relationship with the thoroughly straight Johnson is the most interesting part of the film. Turned from shy naïf to nude exhibitionist, Johnson's straight machismo is affectionately subverted as Weber shoots him in a variety of homoerotic poses (running around naked on a beach with a baby elephant (!), modelling the latest Calvin Klein underwear, and wearing dresses).
As the director freely admits, Johnson was exactly the kind of straight, athletic jock who he'd never have been able to approach at college without ridicule. So it's great fun watching him live out his fantasies here.