I have the suspicion that a LOT of critics are trapped in the 20th century anti-gay mentality that dictates that people who come out as gay always have to suffer horribly and/or die.
I get the feeling that it's more that the stakes in the movie were relatively low. A guy comes out, has a brief falling out with his best friend as their group dynamics shift, then everything is fine again. I think that some older people still regard coming out as this big dramatic thing--that characters don't necessarily have to suffer horribly, but that it can't be light and mostly inconsequential.
So from a critical point of view I could see how this movie would feel too slight (I also think that there were some other issues with the movie that take it down a few notches, not related to the plotting). But I appreciate, as you say, that not every story about a gay person has to be a boiling tragedy. We didn't need to see Evan Todd getting beaten up or disowned by his parents. I liked this movie
because of how light it was, not in spite of its lightness. I think it is kind of daring to show how coming out as gay could be just a bump in the road and not a world-shattering event.
The movie is fluff, but in its own way that's kind of revolutionary because it means we are at a point where gay stories/romances/dramas
can be fluffy and not have the grim shadow of violence and hatred looming over them.
I also appreciated that the movie avoided the obvious (and obnoxious) plot point of having another one of the friends be gay. I liked that the movie wasn't dismissive of Young's character trying to deal with finding out his friend was gay, but also took him to task when he started to be mopey about it. When you have been intimate (in a non-sexual sense) with someone under the assumption that they are not sexually oriented toward you, it would be a bit disorienting to suddenly discover that wasn't true. You'd be looking back at your encounters with a different filter. So I liked that the movie was willing to see the nuance in the different characters.
My only real complaint about the movie was the character of the neighbor, who was this one-dimensional homophobe and who didn't really add anything to the plot. She felt like a caricature, and was out of place when compared to the other more nuanced characters.
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beladornon2
7 years ago
"My only real complaint about the movie was the character of the neighbor, who was this one-dimensional homophobe and who didn't really add anything to the plot. She felt like a caricature, and was out of place when compared to the other more nuanced characters."
The neighbor was a part of the Catholic Church comment made by the script, in which the Church is shown as irrelevant, silly, and impotent. I think this is the best way to deal with oppressors. It's also the way that Jewish comedy writers, like Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks, always dealt with Nazis. Not by making them scary villains [which is the role the Church is usually relegated to] but rather as foolish buffoons, which is much closer to the truth. I hope that, in the very near future, the entire Christian religion will be nothing but a punchline.
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Stovepipe99
7 years ago
The neighbor was a part of the Catholic Church comment made by the script, in which the Church is shown as irrelevant, silly, and impotent.
I don't mind her character being treated as silly as opposed to menacing. I agree that treating her as a nuisance and not a threat takes away the power of her oppression.
But the character was a cartoon and I didn't feel that she fit anywhere near the reality of the rest of the movie which felt relatively grounded and real. I mean, she goes from handing out conversion therapy pamphlets to being like "Eh, whatever, it's 4th of July." The movie offers no reason for her change of heart. I dislike that her character doesn't make sense and doesn't fit in with the rest of the fictional world.
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beladornon2
7 years ago
"her character doesn't make sense"
How lucky you are. and what a wonderfully happy person you must be, not to have been involved with the Church! Doesn't Make Sense is the PERFECT definition for all of the actions of people who are homophobic Christians!
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Stovepipe99
7 years ago
How lucky you are. and what a wonderfully happy person you must be, not to have been involved with the Church!
I'm not religious, but I work in a very conservative,
very religious community. I recognized Evan Todd's character. I recognized his parents. The neighbor was a caricature. I know there are people in real life who are cartoonish. I don't think I've ever run across anyone who was homophobic one day and then had a "live and let live" attitude the next for absolutely no reason. I think that the character was lazily written.
I also think that if you are going to change hearts and minds you can't throw blanket contempt at people (even if some of them totally deserve it). That only creates division and an "us versus them" mentality.
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