Skip to main content

Film Review: "Love, Simon"


Director and producer Greg Berlanti returns to the director’s chair for the first time since his 2010 film, Life as We Know It, to direct the new teen rom-com, Love, Simon. It is a historic film as it marks the first time a major studio has backed a teen rom-com with a gay character as the lead. It is a film that is far from perfect, but it is an incredible first step towards being more inclusive. The film stars Nick Robinson and features a great cast that includes Josh Duhamel, Jennifer Garner, Katherine Langford, Jorge Lendeborg Jr. and Keiynan Lonsdale.
            Love, Simon opens up with Simon doing a quick voiceover on a montage that details how normal his life is aside from having one “huge-ass secret”. During this montage, we are introduced to all of the key characters in the film. He has a loving family, a tight group of friends and seems to do well in school. Despite all of this, Simon always seems to be at a struggle with himself, almost as if he were walking on eggshells. When Simon finds out that there is another closeted gay student at his school, Simon begins an anonymous online friendship with this person, who he knows simply as Blue. As Simon falls deeper and deeper in love with Blue, he tries to figure out who it might actually. However, when his emails with Blue leak, Simon is forced to come to terms with who he is while also facing those closest to him.
            One of the best things about this film is its cast. The chemistry that the cast has with each other is great and really helps carry the film. Simon’s parents in particular (played by Josh Duhamel and Jennifer Garner) are a ton of fun to watch and help provide Simon with moments of levity amidst all the chaos. This film also really emphasizes the impact of social media and how it could affect someone’s life, both positively and negatively.  Love, Simon also provides a very clever mystery plot where Simon is trying to figure out who Blue is in real life. The film does a very good job in keeping the audience guessing throughout the duration of movie by providing plenty of red herrings.
While Love, Simon is a lot of fun, it does also have a lot of issues. Some of the dialogue comes across as odd and doesn’t sound at all like teenagers would speak. While that’s not the case for the entire film, it happens enough times to where it becomes a problem the longer the film goes. Tonally, the film is kind of uneven. It constantly jumps around from being serious to being severely cheesy and over-the-top. Love, Simon ends up feeling like this totally unrealistic world where every single character in this film lives in enormous houses. This would be fine if there was a purpose to that, but there wasn’t. The film could be more relatable if the characters didn’t have such outlandish lives.
The best way to describe this film is actually found in a line from the movie itself. In the first post we see from Blue he describes his life as a ferris wheel where one minute he is on top of the world and the next he is at the very bottom of it. The same can be said for Love, Simon. There are moments of sheer beauty that can move you to tears. There is a scene where Simon confronts the person who leaked his emails that is so raw and emotional that it serves as an example of what this movie really could have been. For all of its faults, however, Love, Simon still manages to be fun and entertaining while delivering an important message to the audience. This film is the first of its kind when it comes to being backed by a major studio and I sincerely hope it’s not the last. These stories matter and deserve to be told to mass audiences. 

            Overall, Love, Simon is a solid film that sits at a 70% for me.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Classic Movie Monday: "Rear Window" vs "Disturbia"

There are certain classics that, in theory, should be much harder to re-imagine than others. Often times, it’s very difficult to modernize certain aspects of a story, whether it be the topic or story plot. By all accounts, Alfred Hitchcock’s mystery thriller Rear Window should have been difficult to adapt in 2007. Rear Window ’s plot makes the film date itself more than other Hitchcock films. At the center of the 1954 film, which stars James Stewart, is L.B. “Jeff” Jeffries, a photographer whose broken-leg forces him to be wheelchair-bound and unable to leave his house. Having nothing else to do, Jeff passes the time by spying on the people from the apartment complex across from his. When he sees what he believes to be a murder at the hands of a man named Thorwald, Jeff takes it upon himself to solve the crime. Rear Window remains one of Hitchcock’s most decorated films, so it is no surprise that eventually someone would try and remake it. The question, however, is how? The idea...
Post a Comment
Read more

Film Review: "Ready Player One"

There aren’t very many directors who have had quite the career that Steven Spielberg has. The man who directed the very first blockbuster in  Jaws , is the same man who has put together some of our most beloved films such as the E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial , Jurassic Park , Close Encounters of the Third Kind , and the Indiana Jones series. It’s the same man that, aside from giving us these wonderfully imaginative films, has also given us hard-hitting dramas such as Schindler’s List , Lincoln and Bridge of Spies . His career has spanned 50 years, and the 71-year-old director shows no signs of slowing down. With his latest film, Ready Player One , Spielberg once again delivers an awe-inspiring film that captures the wonders of the imagination. It stars Tye Sheridan as Wade Watts/Parzival, Olivia Cooke as Samantha Cook/Art3mis, Ben Mendelsohn as the villainous Sorrento and Mark Rylance as OASIS creator James Halliday. The film takes place in 2045 Columbus, Ohio. In this futuristi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Film Review: "Fifty Shades Freed"

            Director James Foley returns to helm Fifty Shades Freed, the franchise’s last installment. The film begins during Anastasia (Dakota Johnson) and Christian’s (Jamie Dornan) honeymoon. Despite Christian’s possessive and jealous nature, the pair appears to be happy until their vacation is cut short as a result of a break-in at Christian’s company. Camera footage reveals the culprit to be Anastasia’s former boss, Jack Hyde (Eric Johnson) and tensions begin to rise.             As if having to worry that Hyde might be after them wasn’t enough, the newlyweds encounter a series of problems within themselves. For one, Christian’s constant hovering over Anastasia doesn’t sit well with her since it gets in the way of her job and personal life. Things become even more tense when Anastasia discovers that Christian isn’t really sure about wanting kids in the future (stuf...
Post a Comment
Read more