Strange Bedfellows (a.k.a I Now Pronounce You Vince and Ralph in some territories) is a 2004 Australian comedy film starring Paul Hogan, Michael Caton and Pete Postlethwaite.
In a small Australian town, Vince Hopgood (Hogan) owns the local movie theatre and several other businesses, and is having trouble paying his taxes because his ex-wife got everything. The news of a new tax benefit for homosexual couples gives Vince an idea: he and best friend Ralph Williams (Caton) can claim to be a couple and receive the benefits. Two complications develop: the whole town finding out, and the national government sending an investigator (Postlethwaite) to make sure the men's relationship is legitimate.
This film features examples of:
- Australia: The film is set in the small country town of Yackandandah, Vince and Ralph also visit a gay club in Sydney.
- Black Like Me: Two working class men from a small country town claim to be gay in order to receive a tax benefit available to couples. However, word leaks out and most of the town ends thinking they are actually gay.
- Coming-Out Story: The film uses this trope in an interesting fashion - two (straight) men living in a small country town registered as a gay couple in order to claim tax benefits, but then had to convince a tax inspector that they really were a couple. Thus, they have to go through all the travails of a Coming-Out Story in a (typically gossip-driven) small town, without actually being gay in the first place. Mostly played for laughs, but with a reasonably sensitive Aesop mixed in.
- Coming Straight Story: Vince and Ralph discover that local camp hairdresser Eric is actually straight and is only pretending to be gay so he can get away with sleeping with many of the local woman.
- Fake Relationship: Vince and Ralph (two straight men) have to pretend to be a gay couple.
- Plot Twist: Ralph’s daughter Carla arrives in town for a visit and to introduce her boyfriend Peta, who is revealed to actually be her girlfriend.
