"Birdy": A Gay Film?

One of my readers is very insistent that I watch Birdy, the 1984 film starring Nicolas Cage and Matthew Modine as Vietnam War-era buddies: "Obvious gay subtext!  Barely hidden gay romance!"

Two questions: "Is there a gay subtext?"  and "If so, is it deliberate?"

Gay subtext: Two male characters who bond with each other in the absence of women, have a domestic relationship, and end up together at the end.

1. The plot: in working-class Philadelphia, Al (Cage) befriends Birdy (Modine), a weird kid who wants to become a bird and thinks he can fly.  Obviously he's trying to escape a traumatic childhood.  They grow up, go to Vietnam, and are both injured and sent home. Birdy refuses to speak, and is sent to a psychiatric hospital.  Al visits and complains that he's faking it; Birdy responds by jumping out a window, as if he can fly.  He doesn't die, however; he ends up on the roof.

2. The desire to fly, to escape, certainly resonates with gay people, especially in the 1980s, but Birdy is so completely broken that one can't imagine him in a consensual relationship with anyone.

3.  Meanwhile Al kisses every girl in sight, two in the trailer alone.

4. In the 1980s and 1990s there were a number of movies about guys befriending broken, unstable, sick, or crazy people.  The sheer custodial nature of the friendship detracts from the equality one expects in a gay subtext.

5. The director, Alan Parker (not to be confused with the porn star), also directed Angela's Ashes, The Road to Wellville, Midnight Express, Evita, and some Madonna videos.  He wrote Melody (about two 12-year olds who want to get married).

6. In the novel by William Wharton, Birdy really thinks that he's a bird.  He falls in love with a female bird (wet dreams but no actual sex)and has a brood with her. 

7. The 1996 stage version is explicitly homoerotic.

8. In the films of the 1980s everyday dialogue was littered with homophobic epithets. It was simply the way that screenwriters assuaged audience's fear that male characters might be gay: "he said 'fag,' he's straight, it's ok to watch."  But Birdy seems to lack homophobic epithets.

9. Matthew Modine starred in Streamers (1983), about prejudice among Vietnam soldiers, including a gay one and And the Band Played On (1993), about homophobic response to the AIDS crisis.

10. Nicolas Cage happarently starred in some movies with homophobic conent, but in the 1980s, what actor didn't?

My verdict: 
Is there a gay subtext?  Sure.
Was it deliberate?  Doubtful.