Canadian director Amnon Buchbinder's coming of age comedy Whole New Thing is an engaging look at an intellectually precocious 13-year old boy who develops a crush on his gay English instructor. Set in rural Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia, newcomer Aaron Webber is outstanding as the quirky Emerson Thorsen whose attraction to his teacher Don Grant (Daniel McIvor) threatens to create serious problems for the teacher, the school, and his clueless parents. While the film delves into unconventional subject matter such as nocturnal emissions and causal sex in washrooms, Buchbinder deals with these topics in a matter of fact way without taking any narrative or stylistic risks.
Rather than continue with home schooling where he seems deficient in key subjects, Emerson's free-spirited parents Kaya (Rebecca Jenkins) and Rog (Robert Joy), enroll their gifted son in the local high school. Emerson has written what looks like a 500-page Hobbit novel and has knowledge far beyond the reach of his rural classmates but is lacking in social and emotional maturity. Looking sexually androgynous with hair coming down his face and a touch of lipstick, he is bullied by his classmates and sneered at when he proposes that the teacher throw away the book they are reading (Snowboard Snowjob) in favor of Shakespeare.
He naively pursues his teacher Don, a gay man, but seems to have no understanding of how his actions are putting his teacher in jeopardy. Buchbinder throws in some undeveloped subplots about Kaya having an affair with a local worker and Don thinking about reconciling with a former lover but the characters are paper-thin and the stories do not come to life. Though Whole New Thing brings some insight into the confusion of an adolescent waking up to sexual ambiguity, I found the relationships unpersuasive and lacking in reality. Aaron Webber, however, is definitely a talent to watch and the haunting score by David Buchbinder, the director's brother, using Arabic, Celtic, African, and rock melodies, played on a group of exotic instruments, is worth the price of admission.
