I went to see this teen gay romance this weekend. Yes it's a little bit cheesy, and the whole mystery of Blue's identity made me feel contrary enough to guess that maybe one of the girls was gay. Did any of the posts specifically say he was a boy? Or was it just the lack of the word "lesbian" rather than "gay" that led to the assumption of gender? I don't know. I never read the book. I also find the idea of a secrets website creepy, and it's weird that Leah urgently calls her friends about every post on the site, even when she doesn't know that it relates to Simon. Made me feel that she might be gossipy and gawking at the secrets, rather than sympathetic to them. I guess it's just the way young kids use social media nowadays.
The opening narration by Simon did seem a little too specific and insistently "I'm just like you" but then it's revealed later to be his introductory message to Blue, so that made it less annoying. After being outed, Simon was silly enough to think that things were somehow "easier" for the out black gay kid in his school, even though that guy gets bullied pretty regularly and his home life isn't perfect. It's a kind of stupid, self-absorbed blindness that comes with youth and white privilege I guess; after all, Simon's not perfect. When being blackmailed, he manipulated his friends pretty cavalierly, but I'm glad that they eventually made up. Nice happy rom-com, even if it was another "coming out" story.
I did like Tony Hale's role as the principal. He was very funny, and so was the drama teacher.
No comments:
Post a Comment