raincitygirl (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
raincitygirl) wrote2014-01-29 05:35 pm
raincitygirl) wrote2014-01-29 05:35 pm
(no subject)
I was watching a movie last night, released in 2007, so presumably shot in 2006, and the main characters both had *phones*. Not smartphones, but ordinary cellular phones. Has the technology really become that ubiquitous that quickly? According to Wikipedia, the first generation iPhone didn’t come out until summer 2007. The Blackberry had been around for quite a while before that, of course. Speaking of which, does anybody have any theories on where it all went wrong for Blackberry? They used to have the smartphone market cornered, and now the company’s on life support.
The movie was called “Shelter”, and it was adorable. Not particularly deep, but sweet. A coming out movie, in which a bright, artistic young man is in a dead-end job and doing a lot of babysitting to support his flaky sister and her 5 year old (to whom he is much more of a parent than she is). A few years before Zach gave up on his dreams of art school to help out instead, and now he’s stuck. He finds solace in surfing (the movie, like so many movies, is set in Southern California near the ocean) and hanging out with his best friend from the private high school he attended on a scholarship. The friend is now living the university dream, although Gabe (the friend) probably appreciates it less than Zach would.
Gabe’s openly gay older brother comes home for a visit, emotionally bruised after the end of a long term relationship. Shaun (the brother) and Zach go surfing together, hang out a lot, and look after Zach’s little nephew Cody. Shaun also encourages Zach to re-apply to art school. All is going swimmingly until they get drunk one night and Shaun kisses him. It evolves from there.
I liked it. Like I said, not particularly deep and not particularly original, but sweet. Zach’s a very appealing main character, and one for whom being in the closet isn’t remotely his only problem. He also needs to learn how to stand up for himself and for Cody, instead of using his responsibilities as an excuse to run away from new experiences that scare him (and I’m not just talking about the new experience of hopping in the sack with Shaun, although he does get to that). He’s stuck, but it’s not only his sister’s fecklessness that has him stuck, it’s internal roadblocks.
And it was beautifully shot, really used the oceanside location to advantage despite presumably being a low-budget movie with a limited budget for cinematography. I’ve never had the desire to learn how to surf, and this movie didn’t change that, but the surfing scenes sure made the ocean look pretty.
It was also interesting and refreshing to watch a movie about twentysomething gay men that didn’t get into the club scene at all. Zach and Shaun aren’t really the clubbing type (besides, they’d need a babysitter), and it felt more like a movie about the type of gay men I know in real life than about the Queer As Folk-type stereotypical scene. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed both the UK and US versions of QAF (and cried like a baby at the end of Season 1 of QAF US), but I used to have to roll my eyes when some silly people would describe them as capturing “the gay experience”. As if there’s only one gay experience.
It wasn’t perfect. For one thing, the movie was lily-white. I’m not sure what the demographic breakdown of the SoCal surfer population is, but surely there are *some* black, Latino and Asian surfers. But all in all, an enjoyable waste of an evening.
The movie was called “Shelter”, and it was adorable. Not particularly deep, but sweet. A coming out movie, in which a bright, artistic young man is in a dead-end job and doing a lot of babysitting to support his flaky sister and her 5 year old (to whom he is much more of a parent than she is). A few years before Zach gave up on his dreams of art school to help out instead, and now he’s stuck. He finds solace in surfing (the movie, like so many movies, is set in Southern California near the ocean) and hanging out with his best friend from the private high school he attended on a scholarship. The friend is now living the university dream, although Gabe (the friend) probably appreciates it less than Zach would.
Gabe’s openly gay older brother comes home for a visit, emotionally bruised after the end of a long term relationship. Shaun (the brother) and Zach go surfing together, hang out a lot, and look after Zach’s little nephew Cody. Shaun also encourages Zach to re-apply to art school. All is going swimmingly until they get drunk one night and Shaun kisses him. It evolves from there.
I liked it. Like I said, not particularly deep and not particularly original, but sweet. Zach’s a very appealing main character, and one for whom being in the closet isn’t remotely his only problem. He also needs to learn how to stand up for himself and for Cody, instead of using his responsibilities as an excuse to run away from new experiences that scare him (and I’m not just talking about the new experience of hopping in the sack with Shaun, although he does get to that). He’s stuck, but it’s not only his sister’s fecklessness that has him stuck, it’s internal roadblocks.
And it was beautifully shot, really used the oceanside location to advantage despite presumably being a low-budget movie with a limited budget for cinematography. I’ve never had the desire to learn how to surf, and this movie didn’t change that, but the surfing scenes sure made the ocean look pretty.
It was also interesting and refreshing to watch a movie about twentysomething gay men that didn’t get into the club scene at all. Zach and Shaun aren’t really the clubbing type (besides, they’d need a babysitter), and it felt more like a movie about the type of gay men I know in real life than about the Queer As Folk-type stereotypical scene. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed both the UK and US versions of QAF (and cried like a baby at the end of Season 1 of QAF US), but I used to have to roll my eyes when some silly people would describe them as capturing “the gay experience”. As if there’s only one gay experience.
It wasn’t perfect. For one thing, the movie was lily-white. I’m not sure what the demographic breakdown of the SoCal surfer population is, but surely there are *some* black, Latino and Asian surfers. But all in all, an enjoyable waste of an evening.