Publisher: CinemaSerf October 23, 2023
This is one of those rare films that tries to deal with the re-emergence of your sexual identity later in life. It centres around the increasingly disillusioned "Ryan" (Joel Ballanger) who meets up with a friend of a friend. "Sam" (Al Braatz) is openly gay and living what we feel to be the tail end of a long term relationship in which he is no longer really invested. It comes as quite a shock to his system for "Ryan" to find that his relationship with his new friend not only pushes his boundaries, but pretty much eradicates many of them altogether and his erstwhile straight life gradually changes. It's a slow burn, this - and that doesn't help it, neither do the annoyingly shifting timelines at the start which are a little confusing. That said, though, director Mark Weeden is trying to illustrate here via some admittedly rather weak acting that love isn't black and white nor straightforward, and there is actually very little one can do when the proverbial Cupid's arrow hits you and you have to deal with the consequences. It's fair to say that both men are pretty selfish. They are caught up in their own desires to the exclusion of many more meritorious of their respect if not their love and that, too, rather put me off as the story advanced along predictable lines. It's also far too long, with way too many lingering shots and establishing imagery that takes the pace off the film and leaves us with an all too meandering exercise in too much introspection. Still, it probably rings true for many an early thirty-something coming to terms with something relatively unexpected yet profound in their lives.