William is an angry young man. But we don't know why. He punches the screen of his laptop in frustration, throws beer cans across the street because his friend walks away, throws a bike to the ground for the same reason, litters a canal and leaves messages littered with the f-word to his friend on the phone - all of which might represent the sort of behaviour we could expect from a fourteen year old boy trying hard to appear grown-up. Interestingly however, there is another fourteen year old character in the film - Effy - and she has the maturity and composure that William lacks despite being half his age. For me this highlighted the problem with this film - there's no coming of age conclusion drawn for William, he simply cannot learn and I was left with the feeling that he will always be that way. On the other hand, fourteen year old Effy will have learned a lot about the kind of young man William is - and she will quickly outgrow him and his loutish type, even though she gave the impression she already had by the end of the film.
As regards the sex with an underage girl issue that rapidly develops into the main topic for the film (the family tracing thing being merely a carrier thread - a shame really as there seemed more mileage in that storyline), well the "will he-won't he?" drama turned into more of a "why would she want to?" question for me and could be seen as failing here given that William appears younger than Effy in both the emotional and maturity senses. A missed opportunity perhaps.
So then, why am I reviewing this film? Well it's not to mention the actor playing the William character, as by cutting and pasting any one of a number of young male actors into the angry young man role would have sufficed, but instead it's to mention the young woman playing the Effy role - Frederikke Dahl Hansen - she was simply magnificent.
As regards the sex with an underage girl issue that rapidly develops into the main topic for the film (the family tracing thing being merely a carrier thread - a shame really as there seemed more mileage in that storyline), well the "will he-won't he?" drama turned into more of a "why would she want to?" question for me and could be seen as failing here given that William appears younger than Effy in both the emotional and maturity senses. A missed opportunity perhaps.
So then, why am I reviewing this film? Well it's not to mention the actor playing the William character, as by cutting and pasting any one of a number of young male actors into the angry young man role would have sufficed, but instead it's to mention the young woman playing the Effy role - Frederikke Dahl Hansen - she was simply magnificent.