Writer/director John Butler’s enchanting coming-of-age movie about two very likable 16-year-old boys in an Irish Boarding School seems to sidestep some of the grittier aspects of homophobia to ensure that the end result is an engagingfeel-good movie that the LGBT community is bound to make it into one of the more popular hits of 2017.
Like most of the other pupils, Ned (Finn O’Shea) is being dumped at the all-male school by his parents so that they can selfishly continue with their own lives without having the distraction of a teenage boy around to ruin their fun. As Ned hates sports, he simply doesn’t fit in as rugby is treated as a religion here and dominates the entire school’s life. Like anyone who much prefers books and learning and his own company, geeky Ned is labeled and taunted as a ‘faggot’. Something which is all but encouraged by faculty members like the bullish rugby coach Pascal (Moe Dunford).
Then halfway through Term, a new pupil arrives and is designated to be Ned’s roommate. Handsome sports jock Conor (Nicholas Galitzine) is the total opposite of Ned and is immediately welcomed into the bosom of the rugby team once they discover what a star player he is. This causes a great deal of friction between the two roommates and Ned piles up all the furniture between their two beds creating a ‘Berlin Wall’ so they do not have to interact with each other at all.
The only enlightened person in this establishment who is not bubbling over with testosterone is Dan Sherry the new English Teacher (Andrew Scott) who actually tries in giving them a balanced and insightful education.
As Conor’s unstoppable prowess on the rugby field catapults the school team towards the championship finals, he becomes a hero to both pupils and staff alike. By this time he and Ned have slowly come to realize that they have a lot more in common than they initially thought, and as the ‘Berlin Wall’ is dismantled, the two actually become close friends. This in itself causes his loud-mouthed macho teammates to tease Conor for getting too close to his ‘faggot’ roommate, and the ragging doesn’t stop until Ned very publicly finally spills the beans that he had discovered the real reason why Conor had been expelled from his last school.
A few weeks previously on the way back from the semi-final match in a nearby town, Ned had casually caught sight of Conor disappearing into what he was shocked to find out was a gay bar. He wasn’t the only one surprised, as inside the Bar was Mr. Sherry the English teacher making out with another man.
Despite the serious topic, Butler imbues some very funny passages and also provides an uplifting end to the movie, and asides from any misgivings one may have on the lack of any real effort to deal with the homophobia, you simply cannot fail to warm to the stories and performances of the two talented and charming leads. Andrew Scott is pitch perfect as the gay closeted teacher who is the one who finally gives some support to young Conor struggling with his sexuality “It gets better, trust me. I can’t say when, but it gets better.”
Labels: 2016, coming of age, drama, Irish
