For better and for worse, the gay teen thriller Ganymede manages to capture the bleak horror of having to listen to a frothing anti-gay rant from some amped-up street corner preacher, or loud-mouthed bully. The kind of slur-filled noise that transmits fear and hate, and not a hint of Christian love.
Too many queer and questioning teens — like the film’s protagonist, high school wrestler Lee Fletcher IV (Jordan Doww) — are subjected to that barrage every day, at home, at church, at school. Lee’s small-town life is one long sermon on traditional values, ministered by his strict religious parents, and hellfire-spouting church pastor, all of whom are aware that the boy is battling certain so-called demons.
Lee is battling those demons literally, not just internally. In his nightmares, and in his waking life, he’s physically stalked by a hideous, skull-visaged creature that creeps out of his closet, or rises from the shadows in a corner of the room.
Conjured by Lee’s fragile, tortured psyche, the Creature (performed, with the aid of prosthetics and makeup, by Lucas Turner) is his sexual confusion and “reprobate thoughts” given physical shape. And, it seems, the Creature is especially triggered by Lee’s attraction to fellow senior Kyle (Pablo Castelblanco), who is gay and out, and totally into Lee.
Thankfully, Kyle is written with emotional complexity to go along with his crush on the good-looking jock. Portrayed with wit and confidence by Castelblanco, Kyle recognizes that Lee is suffering and confused, and not exactly boyfriend material, but he can’t help falling for the wrestler’s kind soul.
In a sweet heart-to-heart, spoken in Spanish and English, between Kyle and his supportive mom, Kim (Sofia Yepes), he confesses his feelings for Lee. His mom warns him to be careful about this boy.
In a different scene, and for completely different reasons, Lee’s mom, Floy (Robyn Lively), warns her son to be careful about Kyle. The cracked mirror images of maternal concern mark one bright spot of understated storytelling in a film — co-directed by Colby Holt and Sam Probst, from a script by Holt — battling its own demons of overacting and over-the-top psychodrama.
Lee’s parents don’t just preach and lecture about their traditional values. Floy and Big Lee (Joe Chrest) — as in “Bigly,” ha ha — shout and weep over their son like the world has ended, or their kid has died. Floy screams her frustrations into the bathroom mirror. Big Lee breaks down sobbing.
These responses might be psychologically valid in a real-world context, but as depicted here, they just look unhinged. Floy screaming to Lee that Kyle is evil because he flaunts his gayness is both high camp and utter drivel: “He’s a little Flaunt Leroy!” That’s an actual line.
“Mom, stop,” pleads Lee. And, he’s right. Please, stop. But then the family’s church leader, Pastor Royer (David Koechner), also calls Kyle a “little Flaunt Leroy.” That’s before the preacher whips out his makeshift electroshock machine for some unsanctioned conversion therapy.
Yet, conversion therapy, and attempts to pray away the gay, only leave Lee even more disturbed, and vulnerable to attack by his demons. Hence, Lee is constantly being scared awake by supposedly frightening, usually imaginary, brushes with the Creature.
He’s holding hands with Kyle, but suddenly, it isn’t Kyle, it’s a demon. Cut to, Lee waking up screaming. A girl at school plays footsie with Lee under the cafeteria table, but it isn’t a girl’s foot, it’s a demon! Lee screams.
Again and again, the film goes back to the same underwhelming well of scream cuts, stirring in blood and body horror, but never evoking the terror that truly grips Lee: his fear of himself.
Ganymede (★★☆☆☆) is available to streamon cable and digital VOD, including Apple TV, Fandango at Home, and Prime Video.
#300Letters doesn't start cooking right away. The spicy, gay Argentinian "anti-romcom" warms up slowly as writer-director Lucas Santa Ana tees up the film's intriguing premise, then commits to the generally well-scripted follow-through.
The basic point-and-shoot camerawork does the script, co-written by Gustavo Cabaña, no favors, but the storytelling engages, along with the attractive cast. Cristian Mariani and Gastón Frías star as crossfit-crazed Jero and queer underground poet Tom, boyfriends who have become a gay "It couple" in Buenos Aires by sharing their unlikely romance on TikTok via The Tom and Jero Show.
You've heard of Chekhov's Gun. Now consider "Chekhov's Bees." If a backyard apiary of bees is introduced at the beginning of the movie, the bees will be whipped into a frenzy by the film's end, terrorizing some poor character.
Bugonia, the fiendishly funny new nightmare from Greek filmmaker/provocateur Yorgos Lanthimos (Poor Things, The Lobster), bears out this theory. The bees belong to our troubled hero, Teddy Gatz (a shaggy-bearded, greasy-haired Jesse Plemons), a conspiracy theorist and amateur beekeeper who lives in an old house with his young, neurodivergent cousin, Don (newcomer Aidan Delbis). Teddy spends his days working a menial warehouse job and his nights traveling down YouTube rabbit holes and obsessively developing theories involving Andromedan aliens who intend to destroy humanity.
Before it veers into a gay cautionary tale, Tadeo Pestaña Caro's stylishly low-key A Few Feet Away maintains an effortless neutrality about the sex and dating exploits of its soft-spoken hero Santiago.
Just twenty years old, Santiago is an architecture student fairly new to Buenos Aires, a fresh, cute twink from the province still gaining his footing in the city. That telling detail, revealed during Santi's first hookup in the film, partly explains why he relies on the dating app Grindr for making new friends.
That does not explain why Santiago simply can't stay off Grindr. He becomes practically consumed with scrolling through faceless, nameless profiles, in desperate search of who knows what exactly. Hiding behind his profile name "Seth," he's not just after sex, it seems, and he's not looking for love, as far as we're led to believe.
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