Love, Simon
[Devin Dayley]
Year Released: 2018
Director: Greg Berlanti
Stars:
Nick Robinson
Jennifer Garner
Josh Duhamel
Synopsis:
Simon Spier is an ordinary teenager. He has a nice family, good friends, everything a young teenager could want. He has been holding something inside, though. He is gay, and no one knows. When a classmate finds out who Simon really is and threatens to “out” him in front of everyone, he must search himself and find out what kind of person he really is.
Review:
Okay, I know I’m late to the ballgame, but I saw “Love, Simon,” finally. First of all it inspired me to do something. I’m gay. This movie was great! A little improbable, which I will discuss a little later, but a great, heartwarming film that the world needed at the time it was released.
There has never been a film like this and I think there won’t be too many other films like this, which is too bad. What I mean by this is there has never been a film that centers on a teenager coming out as gay. You will be hard-pressed to find a film quite like it. There have been films that focus on the LGBTQ community but never a film about this particular subject.
I love how there was a kid who found out and used the threat of “outing” him to blackmail Simon into helping him out and then, ***SPOILER ALERT, he tells everyone anyway.*** That is so high school! I feel bad for anyone struggling with sexual identity anyway, but especially those doing it in high school. High school is such a hard time, in general, then add in there struggling with your sexual identity and that just makes it almost impossible.
The casting of Nick Robinson as Simon was perfect. He was a nice, good-looking guy, not too good-looking though, or that would have seemed suspicious. He was average enough to make us see ourselves in Simon, but good-looking enough to make the film interesting to non-LGBTQ people. Jennifer Garner and Josh Duhamel were also inspired casting for his parents. I’ve said for a long time, ever since I saw “Juno” that Jennifer Garner would be an incredible mom and that she should always play one, and she proved me right yet again. Katherine Langford, also. I am convinced that she can only act in gut wrenching and controversial projects. She plays Hannah Baker in “13 Reasons Why”, for which she slays it, and then she plays Leah in this, for which I also think she slays it.
I hated that when Simon was outed, his friends all made it about themselves and got mad at him. I was like arg, no! Don’t you understand what a hard thing he’s going through right now? His whole world has just been forcibly flipped upside-down and YOU’RE mad at HIM? Thinking about it, though, in high school, people are thinking about themselves all the time and are not always able to see things through other people’s eyes. So that wasn’t a flaw in the movie, it was just something that made me cringe.
Now onto what I thought was unrealistic. The ending, I thought was improbable. The guy Simon had always hoped to be gay is the guy that’s gay and they get together and live happily ever after? And everyone is cool with it and happy for them? I wish life was like that, believe me, with every fiber of my being, I wish life was like that. It’s not, though. What I wish the film would have done is show what happened with his friends at school and with people around the community. But this was a “feel good”movie and I suppose real life doesn’t play as big of a role in “feel good” movies as one would think.
Overall, I loved the movie. I thought it was the perfect combination of gut wrenching and heartwarming. It caused me to want a relationship. Any relationship. A friendship, a sexual relationship, anything. Those that I’ve talked to about deep, meaningful relationships have heard me say that I don’t think I need them therefore I don’t really want them. Now I am like, yeah, I still don’t feel like I need relationships, I can get along fine on my own, but now I want those relationships.
I’m sure that just about everyone who is going to see this movie has seen it already. Regardless, if you’re one of the folks that hasn’t seen this, I highly recommend that you do see it. It gives insight into a world that few people know exist and that even fewer people understand. Just see it. You will like it AND you will feel good about yourself for learning about an "alternative lifestyle."
I would rate this film an 8.5/10.
I realize I dropped a bomb earlier with the whole “I’m gay” thing. More on that to come.
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