[yasr_overall_rating]
Everyone deserves a great love story. But for Simon it’s complicated: no-one knows he’s gay and he doesn’t know who the anonymous classmate is that he’s fallen for online. Resolving both issues proves hilarious, scary and life-changing.
Simon Spier (Nick Robinson) has a “big ass” secret, though, considering the secret, it seems a rather tasteless choice of words. Simon is 17 years old, a high school senior with the nondescript good looks of the boy next door, who crushes for boys instead of girls and no one knows yet. The premise of the movie is that gay people are “just like everyone else” and just as deserving of a happily ever after in love. And with that, I couldn’t agree more.
But Simon Spier is definitely NOT like everyone else. His mother, Emily (Jennifer Garner), is beautiful and smart, the valedictorian of her own high school days. She is witty and sexy and adores her family, perfectly harmonizing with her children while giving space all at once. Meanwhile, his father Jack (Josh Duhamel), is the quarterback of his high school football days, handsome and tough, sometimes an adorable goofball, but also a complete romantic and oh so sensitive emotionally. And Simon even likes his sister.
The family is very beige. They wear beige sweaters and the furniture is beige and the walls are beige. There is no conflict. No rejection. No missing self-awareness. No heartless criticisms.
Simon’s friends: the same. Even Simon: amazingly gentle and others-centered, articulate of his inner turmoil, but also accepting of his lot in life – for a HIGH SCHOOL SENIOR!!
So, the movie is sweet and small-town perfect with a neat and tidy ending to all of the plot twists. It is genuinely funny with the vice principal, Mr. Worth (Tony Hale), and the theater teacher, Ms. Albright (Natasha Rothwell), being the only two truly real-life characters who often say too much of what is on their mind. I will say that these two are absolutely worth seeing the movie for! From quips about dating on Tinder to selling a speaker to get tubes tied, these two actors steal the show and all the laughs.
This coming-of-sexual-age story for Simon Spier is endearing and hopeful and at times even high school cringeworthy, but overall, it is definitely NOT a good representation of what it’s like for “everybody else.” Regardless of sexual preference, neither life nor love is that easy for anyone in high school…or ever. It’s a fairytale romance story except no one is orphaned, the parents are kind and loving, there is no bad guy and in the end, even Simon’s crush not only has the courage to go public but also to do it with everyone literally looking on. I don’t care who you are – those are some incredibly accepting, impressively self-aware, and unquestioningly brave high schoolers.
Ultimately, the film’s effort to present a love story for homosexual teenagers made me wonder if we’ve become so obsessed with love and romance as a society that we will try to gloss over any issue with these pretty pink wrappings. Don’t wanna go through the embarrassment and humiliation of growing pains? Wrap it up in love. Don’t know how to explain war and horrible inhumanities? Tell it from the viewpoint of love. Does it suck to constantly feel like an outsider, as if you don’t belong? Find someone else who feels the same way and fall in love. Love makes it all worth it.
We do hope there is meaning for the experiences we go through. But I’m not sure that the only worthwhile emotion is being “in love.” For almost everybody else, a surprisingly small percentage of our lives is spent IN LOVE, having SEX, enjoying ROMANCE, or happily in an INTIMATE RELATIONSHIP. So, while “Love, Simon” is a dreamy love dream for all of us – gay or straight, still in high school or remembering how much we wish it had gone like this instead – it falls far short as a real story about being “just like everybody else.”
In theaters March 16th
