Holding the Man-2015
Director-Neil Armfield
Starring-Ryan Corr, Craig Stott
Scott’s Review #612
Reviewed January 24, 2016
Grade: B+
Holding the Man is a brave love story centering on two young men and spanning fifteen years as the men begin as high school sweethearts and progress into adulthood and sadly both contract AIDS.
This is a pivotal aspect of the film as it is set during the 1970s and 1980’s- a time when this disease was dreadful and more or less a death sentence.
The film is tender and poignant, but despite these characteristics, I felt at times something with more vigor was missing from the film- I did not have the exact emotional reaction that I thought I might have and felt a slight blandness.
The film is set in Australia and adapted from a 1995 memoir of the same name.
The action begins in 1976 as we meet Tim and John- both high school students. They are from opposite social groups- Tim a theater student and John captain of his soccer team.
Surprisingly, they connect romantically as Tim asks John out on a date.
For the period, it was, the pair receive little hassle and are quite open with their relationship. Certainly, they face a bit of opposition from officials at the school, but this is not the main aspect that the film goes for.
Instead, the main problems come from John’s family- specifically, his father, but this is certainly played safely. Tim’s family is much more accepting.
Over the next fifteen years, the couple encounters death directly when they are simultaneously told they have acquired HIV.
The film is mostly told chronologically, but does go back and forth at times- specifically, we are reminded of John’s youthful good looks in flashbacks, when he is close to death-now bald and sickly looking.
The main point of the film is the men’s enduring love for each other, which is a nice message.
Otherwise, the film (2015 and long since the AIDS plague), goes for a reminder of how harsh those times were for gay men, though there is a softness to the film that I felt instead of the brutal reality.
The actors playing John and Tim (Craig Stott and Ryan Corr, respectively) have decent chemistry, but this may have been stronger than my perception was, and the reason I did not feel emotionally invested in the film.
The film was nice and sweet-the romance part, but when one of the men succumbs to AIDS I should have been a puddle of tears and I just wasn’t.
I did enjoy how the film does not focus too much on the opposition by John’s father (Anthony LaPaglia). He certainly would wish his son’s sexuality differently, but is more concerned with how his son’s relationship with a male looks to Dad’s friends and neighbors. The deeper story was the love between the men that knew no barriers.
It was nice to see Geoffrey Rush and Guy Pearce in supporting turns as a drama teacher (Rush) and as Tim’s father, Dick (Pearce). Both do well with limited roles and I adored how the film portrayed Dick as a supportive father- even dancing a slow dance with his son at a wedding- free of embarrassment.
Also notable is the sweet ending of the film where a photo of the real Tim and John is shown during a narrative from an interview the real Tim did before his death.
Holding the Man is a nice film, but does not quite have the power that other LGBT films in recent decades had- Brokeback Mountain immediately comes to mind as a similar film, but one which was more emotional and engaged me much more.
A nice, honest effort, though.