Beach Rats

First off, by tough to watch, I mean that in a good way. The almost painful, questioning and awkward teenage years of a man learning, or trying to learn his sexuality and family fit with turmoil going on all around him could not be captured better. His "not (his) friends" don't seem to make anything easier for him, and his love interest isn't much better.

The one big difference in this film which in my opinion doesn't make it bad, just makes it unique to what is to be expected from many coming of age/life films around is that a majority of the movie is portrayed not by dialog, but by character demeanor, and actions. It is not a feel good movie, and it is not a re-assuring style film. It is as it tries to be a movie showing the hardship of being a teenage male, unsure about his sexuality or life in fractured times.

I would highly recommend this film if that sounds like your cup of tea, but if you like the more light hearted, or 'scripted' style of teenage life this may not be for you.

**Fair warning this film does have a fair bit of nudity, and drug use among others**

"Beach Rats" (2017 release; 95 min.) brings the story of Frankie, a Brooklyn teenager. As the movie opens, Frankie is on the Brooklyn Boys dating website, where he, tempted but uncertain, looks at the profiles of older guys. We get to know him better as he is hanging out with his buddies on a boardwalk. While at a nearby amusement park, he gets to know a beautiful girl, Simone, and they eventually hook up. In a parallel story, we also get to know Frankie's family: his younger sister, his worrying mom, and his ailing dad, bedridden with cancer. At this point we're not even 15 min. into the movie, but to tell you more of the plot would spoil your viewing experience, you'll just have to see for yourself how it all plays out.

Couple of comments: this is the second movie from writer-director Eliza Hitmann, who a few years ago brought us the equally sexually charged "It Felt Like Love". Here, Hittman portrays the confusion and curiosity and social pressure facing a young guy who is dealing with a heavy family situation, while at the same time also trying to fine his place, or should I say himself. BEWARE: there are a number of pretty graphic scenes in the movie so if that bothers you, please do yourself a favor and check out another movie. I must admit that, as a straight guy myself, I was a bit uncomfortable at times with some of the scenes in this movie. That said, this is a great "little" move that shows a slice of life that feels very real. There are some outstanding performance, none more so that Harris Dickinson as the vulnerable/curious Frankie, and Madeline Weinstein as Simone. Surely we have not seen the last of them. When Frankie and Simone first meet on the boardwalk, they watch the fireworks, which Frankie terms boring and not romantic at all. Responds Simone: "What is your idea of romance?", and that goes to the core of the movie, as Hittman navigates the themes of sexuality, love, longing and belonging.

"Beach Rats" premiered at this year's Sundance Film Festival to immediate critical acclaim. The movie finally opened this weekend at my local art-house theater here in Cincinnati. The Friday early evening screening where I saw this at was attended okay but not great (about 10 people). I can't say that surprised me, given the nature of the film. Yet with positive word-of-mouth this movie surely will get, maybe the movie will find a larger audience, if not in the theater, then later on VOD or DVD/Blu-ray.

Frankie (Harris Dickinson) is in his late teens and lives at his Brooklyn home with his family. He also lives a double life: he hangs out and does drugs with three macho friends while also living a closeted life of arranging sexual encounters with men (mostly middle-aged) on the Internet.

While "Beach Rats" has a standard tone in its coming-of-age storyline, it can be given credit to going where most films dare not go: its man-to-man encounters are upfront. While this is courageous and rare, the movie suffers like many other recent ones including "Good Time" above: the main character is unlikeable.

Franikie's gradual descent into drug dependence might have elicited sympathy but he lacks soul and character whether he's drugging with his friends, having secretive sex with men, trying to go "straight" with a young woman close to his age, or in the few encounters he has with his family.

Some characters in smaller roles do show glimpses of depth but these moments are too few and far between. Director/writer Eliza Hittman uses a cool, distant approach to the characters but as the characters themselves are also cool and distant, there is an empty feeling by the end. - dbamateurcritic

A film about homosexuality made for heterosexuals, 'Beach Rats' neatly fits the tired and restrictive 'LGBT' label by conforming to many of its trademarks, such as self-loathing and confused gay men that simply wish to belong, gays being betrayed by other gays, gays getting beat up, macho blokes, predictable plots and clichéd characters, nudity, homoerotic soft-porn visuals and drug taking.

The underlining psycho-sexual Freudian craving for a father figure (the six pack underwear model guy's dad dies of cancer) is clunky and too obvious, and the cruising and outdoor sex will only shock heterosexual people who are still living in 1995, everyone else will be bored.

The story's conclusion is both preposterous (a closeted gay male tells his aggressive, homophobic friends about a gay cruising site he uses that they can score weed on) and predictable (the effeminate, helpless gay male they trick into meeting them is beaten by the group).

Gay/queer people are some of the bravest you will ever meet, but from viewing a film like 'Beach Rats', you'd never be aware of this. The idea with these intellectually lazy films is to present the world as a predatory, scary place for gay people; sometimes that is very true, and sometimes it is not. I've never been attacked for being gay, for example, yet every 'LGBT' film features a gay bashing. Is this the only way to tackle homophobia -- to show fictional gay bashings? To show repressed, miserable young people hurting other repressed, miserable young people? Does it change the world? Aren't we tired of seeing gay men get beaten up yet?

In the 1970s you had a wide range of incredibly varied queer film makers all over the world making thrilling films, from Fassbinder's nihilistic, confrontational 'f--k you's, to John Waters' palpable joy in seeking to offend everyone on the planet, to Pasolini's fierce socialist attacks on the hypocrites of the world, to Kenneth Anger's esoteric and homoerotic Thelema-inspired creations -- these are films that are still vibrant and powerful to this very day, forty years later, and that is because they were works of complete originality and power, there is no self-loathing to be found in any of it.

No one will be talking about this dated, gay-bashing soft porn in even five years' time.

Harris Dickinson gives an amazing performance as the sexually confused aimless teenager who also faces family tragedy and drug problems. The whole film works well telling the story from his perspective. But the film lacks the ambition to expand the themes touched by it. It should've been daring in exposing the problems faced by the protagonist and the results of his actions. While what's been shown catches the state of mind of the protagonist perfectly, it feels like the film ends without telling everything it could and should have.