SmugKitZine Tied for the best movie I have ever seen

SoftInloveRox Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

DipitySkillful an ambitious but ultimately ineffective debut endeavor.

Aubrey Hackett While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

omega-metim I don't usually review films, but I began this movie with high hopes. The rating is at 6.4, which is damn near Oscar nomination worthy as far as lgbt movies go. 5 minutes in and I'm assaulted by atrocious acting. I thought to myself, maybe I got the movie mixed up. I came back to IMDb to look at some of the reviews, and what pains me most is one reviewer that gave this movie 10 stars admitting that the acting was horrible and that the script wasn't the best. And then this reviewer compared the movie to Shelter (which really was one of those Oscar nomination worthy as far as lgbt films go). But I decided to keep watching. The film really destroyed my concentration. It's not like there is just 1 bad actor, but a litter of them that come in the form of teachers and coaches and parents of the two teens. I'm all for letting a few things slide on account of budget issues, but lets call a spade a spade and admit that this was terrible. If we can't judge a film by the actors' ability to act or the script, then what criteria are we using to judge this? I hope that we're not judging based on the porn scene or the fact that the kids are naked quite a few times in the movie. The basics of the film's script were solid, but it needed to be polished quite a bit. I operate on a scale of 4 to 10, 4 being bad, 10 being outstandingly perfect. And few times I will use the rating of 1 just to say that the film was completely atrocious. I give this film a 4, which is the lowest on my basic scale and the only reason it didn't get a 1 is because the kid dies at the end, and I felt like justice was served. Just kidding. Like I said, the foundation of the script was solid, it was just executed very poorly.

johannes2000-1 Let me begin on the positive side: this is definitely a very sympathetic and sensitive movie, made with integrity and feeling. The storyline is basically simple: a somewhat nerdy and sexually inexperienced adolescent, who's wavering about his true sexual identity, involuntarily gets hooked up with a stunning looking but not so bright jock from the swimming-team and falls in love with him, all the more triggered by the jock's casual flirtatious attitude. This unequal pairing evokes all kinds of trouble, leading to a tragic climax. Photography and direction are fine and the movie is impressively carried by the two protagonists, played by Tyle Olson and Kyle Clare, who are equally convincing in their own storyline as well as in their mutual infatuation.On the other hand I also had some serious reservations about the script. There's just too much stuff going on here, too much issues make the movie rather top-heavy. It's not just (as one would expect) about coming-out as gay and experiencing a first love (and sex) and (as a result) confrontation with rejection and prejudice. That alone would maybe not have been very original but it would have been enough to fill a whole movie. Here they also brought in gay bashing, child-neglect due to divorced parents, alcoholism, drugs-abuse, school-exam fraud and in the end even suicide. By cramping all this in one and a half hour it necessarily results in a somewhat superficial handling of some of these issues. Especially the escalating drug-abuse of Carter and his suicide could have used a more thorough build-up. I also regretted the introduction and the ending of the movie: we see Danny, many years later with his lover (for most of the ensuing movie we're left in the dark whether that lover is the adult Carter or not), making the core of the movie a flash-back in time. It didn't seem to serve any purpose and the point of the movie would have been as strong (or even stronger) without it. The supporting characters are a bit shallow: the mother of Danny is the only one with a substantial and meaningful part in the story, but Carter's father stays a caricature; the stern and rigid coach played by Greg Louganis hasn't much more to do than just be that: stern and rigid (probably Louganis added his name and person to the project out of sympathy); and Danny's best girlfriend (why does every gay guy in a movie always gets hooked-up with a "best girlfriend"!?!) has hardly two whole minute's screen time and for some unfathomable reason is forced to fill these minutes while stumbling around with a crutch (did the hired actress sprain her ankle on her day of shooting or did I miss some metaphor in that?!). Karen Black as the art-teacher maybe could have made more of her character than this mother-like bohemien who huskily whispers positive thoughts to the insecure Danny. She only comes to real life when she tries to persuade a colleague teacher not to pursue a detected fraud by Danny and Carter.On the other hand the opposite characters of Danny and Carter are worked-out very well, as was the gradually growing sexual attraction between the two, which was convincing and actually very sensual. There's a little bit of discreet nudity, not too much to distract from the story but enough to understand the sexual appeal that Carter had on Danny. And the central love-scene was beautifully staged and filmed in a dreamlike atmosphere with rain pouring all over the two entangled bodies. There was palpable chemistry between the two guys, in spite of their odd coupling (which of course was the whole point of the story). As I said before, the suicide was a bit too much for me, maybe it was a logic result of all the goings-on with Carter, but in the build-up of the movie it came quite out-off the blue and we never get any actual explanation, no farewell letter or anything. The total devastation of Danny is understandable, but here the director could have used a little bit more restraint: Danny's extreme gushes of crying are on the brink of hysteria and just not enough in sync with his calm and restrained nature.Olson and Clare do a great job, as mentioned before. Both are good-looking, Clare as a stunning blond Adonis, and Olson in a more endearing and cute way. In my opinion Olson seemed the most promising actor of the two, but this may have been due to the script that made his character more multi-layered than Clare's Carter. All in all I enjoyed this movie very much and I give it a heart-felt 8 out-of 10.

jm10701 For about the first twenty minutes I thought I was going to hate this movie, but it got better. Then it got better. Then it got even better, and it just kept on getting better all the way through to the end.I strongly disagree with reviewers who say the adult bookends are irrelevant and badly done. They provide an essential framework for the story. The adult actors are neither as attractive nor as talented as the younger leads are, but that's fine; they don't need to be.My only quibble - and it is a very minor quibble - is that the character of Henry is just too evil within the context of this movie. I know people like that exist, people who are so mean and so stupid that they would keep on smirking when the hero is having convulsions, but no other character in this movie is drawn with such unrelenting severity. He is so evil he ends up dragging the whole movie down in a way it doesn't need to be dragged down. I suppose his being so excessively monstrous adds extra weight to Danny's accusation that Carter hurt him even more than Henry did, but that accusation didn't need such heavy-handed reinforcement; it was powerful enough in itself.The direction, photography and screenplay could not be much better - an impressive debut for David Oliveras. All the performances are outstanding, particularly Tye Olson and Kyle Clare as Danny and Carter and Casey Kramer as Danny's mother. To paraphrase at least one other reviewer, she is the mother every gay man on earth dreams of. This is a lovely, believable, extremely well done movie.

Michaelckdk This is a phenomenal and beautifully shot film about young gay romance. It is a gripping, dramatic, and moving portrayal of discovery and new love. I mean everything was utterly amazing: from the actors' performances (especially the Danny character), to the cinematography and even the haunting score playing all throughout. The movie is longer than most (almost 2 hours) but you honestly don't feel it because the story is so captivating and engaging. This is by far one of the best films ever made in this genre of gay themed dramas. There are scenes depicting sexuality with the unbelievably beautiful body of the swimmer character, but they are done tastefully and shot with an entrancing artistry. If there were Oscars for in-dies like this, I'd award it all the top honors. Highly recommended to the point I will compare all future films of the genre to this one! Truly a gay classic with an above average production value !