| Product: |
Beautiful Thing (DVD) |
| Date: |
14.04.05 (437 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Lovely Story, easy to watch, fantastic Soundtrack
Disadvantages: some may not like the subject matter, but their loss!
You are at high school at the later end of your education and the last thing you want is to play football with the ‘popular’ lads. So you bunk off. Back you go to your high rise council flat summers day in the middle of a heat wave. For that journey, you don’t seem to have a care in the world, running along, then getting back home for a sandwich and to pop yourself down in front of an old black and white movie.
Then your mum comes home. Life is tough dealing with your sexuality, having to deal with your crush on the boy next door and the mother who is transfixed on her new hippy boyfriend.
However, you can’t believe your luck. Ste next door, gets in trouble with his dad for ruining the bubble and squeek and you mum takes him in and asks if you would mind topping and tailing for the night! Finally, the chance to get to know him better…
Beautiful Thing is exactly what it says on the tin. A movie that every young gay man of my generation has seen and loved, it tells the touching story of two young guys who find each other in the mess that is their adolescent lives.
The premise is very simple. Jamie lives with his mum, hates school and is pretty sure that he is different from all the other boys. Ste lives with his dad and drug dealing older brother and has to deal with abuse from both of them however gets along well in terms of popularity in school. When the above situation happens, they find themselves getting closer and talking about stuff that they would not have thought about in the past, very dubious and careful what they reveal at first, but as they get more comfortable they start to get more confident.
The storyline as said, is very simple. However at the same time, it manages to deal with a few very important issues in the boys lives. For example single parenting, coming out, drugs, proper friendships, step parenting and a good few others. All are dealt with great sensitivity, never sensationalising it and making it feel like its being told ‘like it is’.
The characters are maybe slightly stereotypical, but not to the extent that it spoils the film in any way. Jamie is very much the geeky unpopular kid, Ste is liked by all the girlies and is good at football, Sandra is a typical working mum who wants better for her kid but finds it tough dealing with the situation, Tony (the mum's boyfriend) is your typical stoner who goes through life without a clue about anything and Leah (who lives next door to Jamie), well, she has been expelled from school and spends her whole day tripping on drugs and singing along to old Mamma Cass songs! So not quite sure what stereotype you would put her in!
In terms of acting, by far the star of the film was Linda Henry (Yvonne Atkins in Bad Girls). She is fantastic at portraying how the character struggles with supporting her kid, and the coming out scene is so well acted by her that on first watching it, there is barely a dry eye in the house. Out of the two boys, Scott Neal (The Bill) was slightly better at playing Ste although there was nothing really wrong with Glen Berry as Jamie, just that Neal’s acting seemed more accomplished. Tameka Empson was very effective in taking on the comedy role of Leah and provides no end of laughs with it.
This was Hettie MacDonalds first shot at directing although she has gone on to other TV work. In keeping everything seemingly simple, she was very effective in letting the story work through without feeling at all rushed at any point, and keeping us focused on the story as a simple love tale between two people on the brink of exploring their adulthood. She kept it very clean and above board with no need for any kind of censorship. The most you see from the two guys is a bit of kissing, dancing and holding hands. In this vain, I feel that they were a bit harsh in giving it a 15 certificate as this could easily have gone through as a PG – it really is very tame. However, the film was made in 1996 so I think it may be classified differently now.
The master stroke of the movie for me was the soundtrack. The whole film is awash with songs by The Mama’s & The Papa’s and this works incredibly well. Again it seems to add to the simplistic nature of the storytelling and the innocence that is being conveyed by the two boys. A great example of this is when they are running though the park having a laugh with each other and “Make Your Own Kind Of Music” is playing. So apt for the circumstance.
Extra's? What extra's?! There are some cast biographies as well as the theatrical trailer, but thats where it ends. It does make the navigation of the DVD very easy, and to be fair it really is such a good film that I don't think it needs any extra's to make it worth owning.
So in conclusion, I cannot recommend this film enough as it is such a lovely, non sensationalised, simple tale of first love. It is much more about the love story than just coming out and it shows that this kind of love can be 'normal' as opposed to the plethora of gay themed films out there that portray the seedier side of gay life. It is perfect for you to cuddle up on the couch with a loved one (of any orientation) and enjoy the magical story told in such a sensitive way. Five stars from me!
drew :o)
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