Holding Trevor

I was fortunate to see Holding Trevor and this film can and should propel all the principles into more film work.

Brent Gorski wrote the script and stars but he has written story lines that enable each of the 4 main characters to shine.

Director Rosser Goodman shows us a believable look at a tight-knit group of friends in LA. (Please don't think: 'The Hills'. These friends live probably in the flats -- geographically and perhaps philosophically miles away.) They're gay, straight, funny, caring but these aren't 'sit-commy' friends. I'm sure if you see this film you'd say: 'I know somebody just like that.'

Goodman strikes just the right tone of humor and pathos. We can relate to the twists and turns life takes while we're trying to find happiness.

On top of that -- good music, too!

Sometimes the phrase "low-budget movie' may not inspire one to go see it. But, that would be too bad because honest, heartfelt films made by passionate filmmakers should be supported.

feelings, fears, expectations, decisions, faces of new beginning. and a character who can be every of us. because it is not exactly a gay story. it is only search of best option in a desert of reality. a pledge for friendship virtues and need of the other. an exercise to define reality as drawing of intentions. and demonstration of human relationships. central virtue - the music as morning cigar smoke. and the courage of script to build nuances of a small universe as steps of new level. not a remarkable film. but a good occasion to discover the roots of common life. and to understand it more than part of accident. or part of generally lust.

A young man struggles to find purpose and meaning as he pulled in different directions by best friends, ex-partner and new man in his life.

Rule number one: in order to take the audience on an 'in simpatico' journey with the troubled young protagonist, a film/script/level of character development must allow the audience to care. Trevor's problems are well telegraphed - dead-end job, ambivalent support from his friends, cyclical torments caused by junkie ex-lover, estrangement from family etc., but as Trevor is so unappealing, we find it hard to care. All the primary characters are so self-serving - Trevor's life is all about the aforementioned miseries, Jake is sour and one-note sarcastic, Andi is utterly self-absorbed (I want a man/I don't want a man), Daryl's addiction behaviour patterns and Ephraim's need for commitment and reassurance. Everyone looks at their lives and events with such a total lack of empathy that when Andi finally explodes and delivers her drunken tirade at Trevor for being so self-obsessed I actually had to laugh. Holding Trevor isn't about relationships with others, it's about relationships with 'self', and the eventual choice made by Trevor (start afresh or replace one needy and suffering friend with another) seems to reinforce this - Jake, Andi and Ephraim all put themselves first ('you can't go/stay; we need you') and for all the suggestion of positive change (Trevor's quitting from his job), the reality is just more of the same for poor, poor Trevor... his choice.

This film deals with serious issues like HIV tests, drug addiction and holding on to vulnerable people. This deserves a 3 but the working out of all these issues is damaged by disjoined scenes, almost incomprehensible dialogue ( I live in the UK and still I could not understand their messy use of English, or rather a variation of it ) and characters who jump from scene to scene without anything worthy of the word continuity. At times it holds together, then it falls apart. The camera work is all over the place literally, and overall I think it is a failure. Sadly too many of this kind of badly thought out, badly produced product is put on the market and gay film, niche market that it is, charges more than they deserve. I found it among my collection realising I had not watched it. I endured it. Also the music which is banal beyond belief fills in gaps that could have been used for the above serious issues. Trevor is not worth holding.

This starts off with a straight woman masturbating in bed where she's disturbed by a gay male friend phoning her . The gay male friend then has his partner perform fellatio on him and then the partner suffers a drugs OD . Have I mentioned that the opening credits haven't finished at this point ?

Oh dear yet another feature from independent cinema . Maybe there is a market for this type of very limited release . Maybe there isn't . Or maybe the whole film's function is to make a film so the production team can hone their film making skills before moving on to better things . I've got to brutally honest and say the production team on HOLDING TREVOR still have a long way to go

The fundamental problem is that very little of note happens in the film . Characters spout existentialist dialogue in a totally unconvincing pretentious manner . There is not one sympathetic character in the movie and for a film that supposedly is made to appeal to a gay audience the gay characters are acted in a totally camp way which makes for a totally uninvolving film regardless of your sexuality