Is Dickie gay in The Talented Mr. Ripley?

Dickie is a narcissist, he likes the attention even though he would never have romantic feelings for Tom. Dickie leads Tom along to feed his own ego. Marge says it best "The thing with Dickie... it's like the sun shines on you, and it's glorious. And then he forgets you and it's very, very cold."

Nudity is sexualized in America more than anywhere else. Being naked alone doesn't indicate sexual interest unless you would say every man who's ever been naked in front of another man in a locker room is expressing sexual desire.

Dickie's true feelings are more clearly expressed when he catches Tom dancing around in his clothes. He's clearly uncomfortable and asks Tom to change out of them in the other room.

In the tub scene, when Tom wants to get in Dickie almost throws up in his mouth and sternly says no. Only after recognizing that Dickie wasn't down for the get down does Tom then say "I didn't mean with you in it." Dickie then relaxes and gets out, however he swats his towel at Tom as a way to break the tension I think by letting Tom know everything was still okay, like no biggie bro.

The real question is: is Dickie aware of Tom's homoerotic lust? As a gay man, I found the whole premise of Tom, the non-rich outsider, a metaphor for being a gay man in the 50s...the ultimate outsider desperate to belong.

Because we live in an essentially homophobic (albeit improving) culture...we even have this question regarding Dickie's sexuality. A real life Dickie would likely be sexually adventurous and have numerous sexual partners of all genders...he would fight a "label" and in the late 50s especially the gay culture was into plenty of gender role playing...so neither Tom nor Dickie are necessarily "gay" - Tom's appetite for Dickie's life that it includes a desire to consume him sexually or otherwise...

In that scene, Tom asks to get in the tub and Dickie gets weirded out and gets out of the tub so I do not think Dickie was gay or had any feelings of that sort towards Tom.

I didn't really think Tom was actually gay in the movie. I never saw Dickie as gay. Even Freddie had many hand gestures and things he said that kind of made him look on the 'gay side'...yet I think this was meant to be an upper-class, high society-type thing. Freddie mentioned being into 'the women' a couple of times. I think Tom was obsessed and wanted to be Dickie. I know he was checking him out naked in the tub scene--but I always saw this as admiration and envy more than anything actually sexual. He wanted to be beautiful and tan, like Dickie. I didn't see that he was in love with Peter, either. I thought he used him as a sad replacement for Dickie (who was dead by then) and perhaps also as a free ride, money-wise. I know he used Dickie's ID and got money out of the bank, but how long would that have really lasted? He couldn't continue to do that after he saw an investigation forming, so surely the money ran out.

I sort of thought Tom was 'appeasing' Peter so he could continue to tag along, being that Peter made it very clear that he was gay. I think he liked him very much as a friend and really craved feeling loved and admired by someone. Peter filled this need for him. He wanted to be adored and admired like Dickie was by so many.

I definitely never thought Dickie was gay. I thought he was a narcissist who loved any attention. He led Tom on a little because he really loved and craved being admired and doted on... by anyone.

I guess I never saw any real sexuality in Tom. I saw a calculating sociopath who wanted to be loved, to have 'the good life' and to be accepted by this upper-class group of people as an equal. I think Tom would have 'been' with anyone (male or female) to stay part of this group and continue to live this life. This is just my take on it, though.