MovieChat Forums > Closet Monster (2016) Discussion > I wanted to be impressed, but I just was...

I wanted to be impressed, but I just wasn't.

posted 8 years ago by vegicat
4 replies | jump to latest

This was a weird movie. Like a smashup of an after-school special about how parents divorcing sucks, mixed up with some "Look Who's (Hamster's) Talking, Two" and some really soft teen sexuality drama. I mean, what was up with Isabella the talking hamster? It added nothing to the movie at all.

Also, plot devices that involve animals are so tired. When you see an animal in a movie and know at some point it's going to be killed in order to make some poignant point about something about people... redo the story. Leave the "animal dies to create storyline angst" crutch out and re-write it better so you can get across something with depth by telling the story more effectively. So cliche.

Weird, but not in a unique or good way. As if the filmmaker was doing a school project or something.

[–] wearyourlove 8 years ago

Well, the hamster has a couple of functions. Most importantly on an emotional level is that he/she serves as Oscar's only reliable form of companionship and support after his parents split. The fact that his closest friend is a talking hamster rather poignantly underscores, I think, some of the ways in which queer people are forced to seek moral support outside of a traditional heteronormative system. Secondly, he/she helps to thematize certain ideas in the film, namely the fluidity of identity, but also how we erroneously assign fixed labels and essences to people. The hamster, after all, is not anatomically female, nor is he/she even one hamster throughout the film, yet Oscar makes her so (innocently, of course) even though she isn't what he says she is.

[–] vegicat 8 years ago

I like your thoughtful answer. I can see how that makes the hamster more relevant. Still, I don't think it was executed well. With Isabella doing the voice-over, it was just distracting in a bad way. I kept thinking the hamster was suddenly going to get animated and the whole thing turned into a cartoon. Or, that it was going to turn out the dude was having a psychotic split. ;)

[–] ciffou 7 years ago

I wasn't impressed either, but unlike you I think the hamster was the most enjoyable aspect of the movie.

[–] vegicat 7 years ago

Hah. I liked the hamsters -- I just think they should have had their own movie. ;)