BEHIND THE SCREEN PUBLICATIONS

TALL GIRL

April 15th 2020

This review contains spoilers for the movie “Tall Girl”

The movie tall girl highlights some of the struggles people who don't fall into the category of “normal” undergo every day.  The main character struggles with insecurities, bullying, and a difficult love life. The movie is set in a high school, where teenagers are the most critical about their appearance and the most judgemental about others.  Many people make fun of Jodi, the main character, for her height of 6 feet and 1 ½ inches which forces her to tower over all of her peers. Many of her classmates ask her how the weather is up there and give her nasty nicknames like Godzilla, which makes her even more self-conscious about her ever-growing height.  

Jodi has had trouble finding a boyfriend due to her mens size 13 Nike’s but after a foreign exchange student, Stig Mohlin, comes to her school she falls in love.  Her enemy has marked her territory and claimed Stig as her boyfriend but Stig has other intentions. He befriends Jodi and kisses her on the bus ride home, adding to the love and drama of this story. Jodi and Stig try to remain friends but eventually end up falling in love which upsets Stig’s girlfriend.  The ending of the movie takes an unexpected turn when Jodi chooses her friend who has been in love with her since elementary school over Stig and eventually embraces her towering height. Jodi realizes she does not have to be short to be pretty and loves her new self.

LOVE SIMON

April 16th 2020

This review contains spoilers for the film “Love, Simon”

The movie “Love, Simon” uses every cliche in the book, well, almost.  The story has a main plot point that differs from most other romance movies. The main character, Simon, is gay, but he's not out yet.  The movie tackled some very important issues people in the LGBTQ+ community often face such as coming out, worrying about acceptance, acting straight, and many more. One of the most iconic scenes in the movie is a short montage of what it would be like if straight people had to come out, or if straight wasn't the default.  The scene shows a few characters sitting their parents down to have a serious conversation and the parents sobbing and being overall devastated. It shows heterosexual people what LGBTQ+ people face and how ridiculous it is to have to make a huge deal about being yourself and then being bullied and hated just because of it.  

The drama begins with someone going by the name of “Blue” comments on a popular messaging platform about being scared to come out as gay. Simon sees this and messages Blue using the fake name of Jacques, to keep his true identity confidential.  The movie is based around Simon trying to figure out who Blue really is. He uses clues such as Blue's favorite type of Oreo and the mystery slowly drives Simon insane making him question if any one of the people he sees could be Blue. The romance takes a turn when a character named Martin finds Simon's secret and blackmails him into helping get him a date with Simons friend Abby, who wants nothing to do with him.  After Simon's emails with Blue are revealed to the school, Blue is scared and sends one last email to Simon telling him that they should no longer email and deletes his email account. At this point, Simon is devastated and feels as though his life is falling apart. Simon posts on the message board, explaining and clearing up the drama and gossip and asks Blue to meet him at the school carnival. The two eventually meet and kiss on the Ferris wheel while all of Simon's friends cheer him on, giving the cliche happy ending of finding love.

FAULT IN OUR STARS

April 17th 2020

This review contains spoilers for the movie “The Fault In Our Stars”

The Fault In Our Stars is a tear-jerker that does not give a typical happy ending to the viewers.  The two main characters, Hazel Lancaster and Augustus Waters are both suffering from cancer and meet at a cancer support group.  After the meeting, Augustus invites Hazel over to his house to watch a movie. After the friendship grows Augustus ends up using his wish to take Hazel with him to Amsterdam, where one of her favorite authors lives.  Augustus had pulled some strings and gotten an invite to his house so Hazel could ask some questions about a book he wrote, “An Imperial Affliction”. When they get there, they go to his house only to find him drowning in booze and they find that his assistant has actually given the invite to them.  Hazel still tries to talk to him, ignoring the mean comments the drunk is spewing and then he claims he cannot answer her questions.  

Augustus and Hazel's romance begins when they visit the Anne Frank house with the author's assistant and share a passionate, and very public, kiss. Earlier, Hazel had compared herself to a grenade and was worried that when she died she would hurt Augustus and he wouldn't get over it, but Augustus assured her that he wanted to spend what little time they had left together. Augustus had a body scan that revealed that cancer had spread everywhere in his body and he only had a short period of time left.  Hazel realizes Augustus was the grenade and says she wouldn't trade the short amount of time they had together for the world. Augustus knows he is dying and has a pre-funeral with himself, Hazel, and his friend Issac where his friends read eulogies so that he can attend his own funeral. Hazel includes a part of the book “An Imperial Affliction” which explains smaller and larger infinities. Augustus dies shortly after and to her surprise, Hazel finds the author, Van Houten, at his funeral. He answers Hazel's questions but she is interested as he had ruined his reputation to her.  Issac then reveals to her that Augustus had a sequel to “An Imperial Affliction” in the works but his cancer had put an abrupt stop to his project. The emotional romance ends with Hazel saying she is happy with her decision in response to Augustus's words, getting hurt is inevitable, but we get to choose who hurts us and that he is happy with his decision.