Its In the Water, writer-director Kelli Herd's spanking new comedy, takes place in Azalea Springs, a small town where homo-hating pops up regularly in the conversations of its male-bonding, socially-snooty Country Club "men" or among Junior League members, masquerading as "the ladies," thus providing a not-very-pretty peek at lifestyles of the lone and listless.

The film's title is taken from mischief that's played by the town's rollicking rascal (John Hallum) who spreads rumors that people get "that way" because there's an unknown ingredient in the water.

A sample of the cinematic arts at its best, Its in the Water is a well-crafted, sophisticated assault on everyday prejudices. The most effective assaults on bigotry, after all, are those in which the bigots become just feisty enough that they unwittingly and subtly ridicule themselves.

Kerri Jo Chapman stars in this cozy farce which features people who prefer golf to sex. Chapman plays Alex Stratton—whose mother ( Beverly May) is addicted to cosmetics—and whose social-climbing husband pines long and longingly only to feel and finger his golf clubs.

Alex Stratton, in contrast to her neighbors, has cultivated a coterie of gay friends. When she quits Junior League in favor of doing volunteer work at Hope House, an Azalea Spring AIDS hospice, she raises local eyebrows, adding unexpected flavors to her husband's crass attempts at social climbing.

Homophobic diehards in this movie go down in flames, their bloopers of blame crashing in heaps of comedic craziness. The insipid Sloan, who was Alex's best high school friend (Nancy Chartier) comes off looking like a cheerless cheerleader.

John Addicton plays the creepy Brother Daniel. He's a hypocritical church leader (and a closeted leatherman) who hosts Ex-Gay ministries –Homo-No-Mo.

Another old friend of Alex's, played by Teresa Garrett, turns around—after a failed heterosexual marriage—and becomes manager of Hope House, the hospice.

The integration among straights and gays that takes place in this fine film is exemplary. "There is no them," said the great neo-anarchist gay thinker, Paul Goodman, "there is only us." Its In the Water takes creative new turns proving the truth of this sage adage.

Don't miss it.