Caligula, Helen, Brandon, and me.

So here we are at the end of another year. The end of another century. The end of another millennium. And what can we say for ourselves? Well, one thing's for certain: We're better off now than we were under the Visigoths. Hell, if Bob Guccione's right, we're better off than we've been since Caligula ruled the Roman Empire.

Speaking of which, if any of you Daughters of Bilitis didn't catch the rerelease of Caligula in theaters this fall, you missed what has to be the most graphic and, by my lights, probably the most arousing lesbian sex scene in the history of cinema. If you need more convincing, let me just say to everyone who worked herself into a lather over Prime Suspect that half of said Caligula scene features a nubile Helen Mirren menaging a trois in the altogether. 'Nuff said?

You remember Mirren in Kevin Bacon's 1996 lesbo B-movie Losing Chase? Lots of tuna drama in that one but no down and dirty sex acts, which is, of course, the standard template for any lesbian film: laborious courtship that lasts the whole damn movie; lots of long walks in the woods and deep conversations about arts and crafts; at least one stealthy late-night visit to the sleeping love-object's boudoir, where yet more silent mooning is done and no hoochie had; and finally the moment of truth, when our little Tristan and Too Olde exchange therapists and call it a day.

You'll find no such tantalizement in Caligula. Just the ass, ma'am--and a lot more besides. You'll even get to see Mirren being lead around on a leash and boffed doggy-style in the imperial den of iniquity. Let's just say that this is the movie that every good lesbian (who was too young to see it on the big screen back in 1980) has earned after having sat through years of frisky nuns and mothballs at the gay and lesbian film festival.

If popular cinema is any indication, this year was an auspicious one for lesbianism in other ways too. Aside from finally getting our rocks off in pagan Rome, perhaps one of the most important lesbian films ever made pulled in some big bills at the local cineplex. Boys Don't Cry, the true stow of pre-op transsexual Brandon Teena, sold out its first few showings in New York City. Usually this kind of film would have been relegated to the art houses. There, Boys would have gone unnoticed by the masses.

But surprisingly enough, it seemed that mainstream America was interested in and concerned about the young woman who disguised herself as a young man in rural Nebraska. Teena dated the local beauties and for some time went undetected as a swain. Eventually Teena was exposed as a woman and was brutally raped and murdered by two male former friends. Of course, it's entirely possible that straight America simply wanted to see what they considered a "freak of nature" get her comeuppance, but it's exceedingly difficult to emerge from that film thinking that Teena was anything short of a latter-day Joan of Arc.

The lesson to be learned from all this is that while most of us are enjoying as much deviant sex as the ancient Romans did and doing so without risking our necks in the least, plenty of our contemporaries are not so blessed. Perhaps time is irrelevant in this. Trying to make sense of how much or how little has changed since we counted the date in double digits gets sticky and bewildering. Two millennia have passed since the Roman emperor Nero dressed a castrated boy, Sporus, in bridal drag and wed him in public. Yet today, gay marriage is still illegal in all 50 states, even in Hawaii and Alaska, which briefly flirted with it through ballot initiatives in 1998.

Still, gay and lesbian couples are committing themselves to each other publicly in greater numbers than ever before. But savage and all-too-primitive shows of violence are still being wreaked on gay people like Teena, who are doing little more than just being themselves. Perhaps the changeability of public opinion on homosexuality should both frighten and inspire us, encourage us to agitate for better treatment but remind us to do so warily.