Heads of State and The Mythos of Male Friendship

Male friendship is one of life's most fascinating mysteries. At least to me.

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I'll be the first to admit that I'm an outsider here, but sometimes watching my male friends interact seems like an episode of Planet Earth. Take last week for example.

I'm chilling in the basement with some of the boys, and before I can even blink all six of them were down on all fours, hurling insults I don't care to repeat at each other, and desperately trying to prove which of them could do the most push-ups. Something about strength and stamina being necessary for future engagements.

It seems like the straight men in my life are walking a tightrope whenever they hang out with their buddies. And that crystallized for me when I watched the latest direct-to-streaming action movie, Heads of State.

I was struck by its construction of straight male relationships. Yes, it's a cheesy action movie (the best kind), but there was something about it that rang very true to life. Amongst the gunfire and one-liners, the real story in Heads of State isn't about government conspiracy. It's about the power of friendship.

John Cena is the President of the United States, and Idris Elba is the Prime Minister of the UK. They don't get along. Idris thinks John is a bumbling fool without any political experience (he is) and John thinks Idris is stuck-up, arrogant, and doesn't take him seriously (he doesn't). There's only one thing that they have in common. They can't communicate for shit.

Heads of State confirmed what I had observed in the basement that night. Male friendships couldn't be too eager, to earnest. Instead of hyping "the boys" up, men communicated through roasts and feats of strength. I love a well-timed jab, but my female friends and I connect way more through conversation than sick burns. My girls know everything about me, every part of my day, every TMI detail. It makes me sad that my male friends don't seem to have that same kind of freedom. Beneath all the laughter, there's an undercurrent of fear. Fear of being judged, of running afoul of all the unspoken rules of engagement that they have spent their lives abiding by.

Be a man. Don't be a burden. Don't make it weird.

Both of the beefcakes in Heads of State are too caught up in their own egos to realize that they have the same goal. After a terrorist attack brings down Air Force One and strands the two world leaders in the middle of nowhere Belarus, they have to make it back to safety to stop the....

Uhhhhh...

something something bad guy, something something government conspiracy...

Whatever, I was there for the laughs and the fight scenes. But I digress.

If they would just talk, the movie would be over in about 30 minutes. But the strict guidelines that govern male social interaction are apparently stronger than the frickin' Geneva Convention.

Just the other's mere existence seems to challenge these guys' manhood. It's a strange dichotomy to witness. In order to get along, they have to think that the other is a strong man worthy of respect, but not cooler than them, that would be emasculating. Instead of working together to find a solution, it goes like this:

• Idris mocks John's lack of cardio and calls him "gym strong."
• John apes Idris' posh English accent and points out his own high poll numbers.
• They race to see who can assemble their machine guns faster.
• Both refuse to ask for help.

It's okay boys, you don't have to beat your teammate. Just the bad guy with the grenade.

This pattern of macho-man posturing has existed in buddy action movies for a long time. Think the love/hate relationship between Healey and March in The Nice Guys. The charged back and forth of Iceman and Maverick in Top Gun. Mike and Marcus trying to out-quip each other at every camera-whirling turn in Bad Boys.

Hollywood has taken a stance. Boys can be vulnerable, but only under very specific, pre-determined conditions. In Heads of State, our two heroes have to survive a plane crash, gun their way out of a safe house, sneak across borders and narrowly avoid getting blown away by a bazooka before they can shed their airs of superiority and have a conversation. Turns out they both just want the best for the people that elected them. And to get home to the people that they love.

This heart-to-heart is immediately undercut by a jab about sucking sheep nipples, but hey, it's a step. And if we're being honest, when it comes to male bonding, truth is often stranger than fiction.

I really am amazed by my male friends. Obviously, they are close, but the dynamic is just... Different. It really hit home for me when I got back from a day out with one of my best friends, and my (male) buddy asked me what we had been doing all day.

"Nothing much, just wandering around and chatting," I said.

"Oh, that's it?" was his response.

My first instinct was to be offended, but before I bit into him I realized something. He NEVER just hangs out with his friends.

Whenever they meet up, it's to play golf or work on somebody's car. They don't gossip over tapas or go for a coffee to catch up. At least for these boys, their friendships always seem to be about doing rather than feeling.

And that's what finally forges a bond between Idris and John. Through literal blood, sweat, and tears, they move from reluctant allies to best bros. Nothing like taking down a helicopter together to bond two fellas. It's the action that finally lets them drop their guards. They're both equally cool and masculine, so why not admit it?

And at the end of the movie they get to do something I hope for every man. They have a cheeky gossip sesh. But instead of tapas and margaritas, they've got fish and chips and a few pints.

Hell yeah, brother.

This is just one woman's opinion though. I'd love to hear more about male friendships firsthand. Everybody's different, and my sample size is small, so lemme know what it's like out there boys.