Lieve jongens

This has to be one of the poorest excuses for a film I have ever seen.

The tape box gives an impression that it is an award winner and contains controversial male nudity.

I would like to know what kind of award, if any, this movie ever won. And the nudity is unerotic and nothing I would consider controversial. And the guys aren't that goodlooking either.

I should have known the tape box didn't know what it was talking about when the front said the movie was in Danish and the back said the movie was Dutch.

Two of the characters are called boys, but they are in their 30s at least and not all that goodlooking. The other older main character is crass throughout, going as far as putting his penis on a plate for breakfast, farting in a wine glass and blowing bad breath in the face of someone he is supposedly trying to seduce.

And while all movies don't have to have a plot, I kept asking what the point of any of this junk was.

Keep away from this film. There are other much more erotic films and much more artistic films from The Netherlands, and almost every other country.

For modern audiences (2015) Lieve Yongens (Pretty Boys) is not the easiest film too watch. Being filmed in 1980, it is already a bit dated. Not from the audacity. There are plenty of nudity scenes, but the stills are not too well preserved, the form of bodies are very different from nowadays gay movies and the cinematography, normally taking the subjects from afar, are typical of films from the seventies filmed ins Europe (it's Dutch). The movie tells the story of Wolf (Hugo Metsers) an aging writer (but still with good looks and body) trying to seduce Woelrat/Muskrat (Hans Dagelet) a younger boy, lover of a much elder person. He does it through fantasy. Telling erotic and frequently sad-masochistic homo-erotic tales to Woelrat he succeeds, to a point, in bringing him to his bed. For the time of filming, the film is very bold, giving lots of candy eye to persons that presently aren't the pattern of looks, but have their charm. The subtitles run fast but, if you can cope with that, it's a film that worth seeing, at least to show what of most advanced was filmed during nearly four decades ago.

If someone says that this movie sucks, then it is clear to me that they don't understand the movie at all. Most important of all: you HAVE to have read the books of the author (gerard van het Reve) to understand all the movies based on his books. Most of his stories are autobiographic and tell about complicated (SM) relationships. The caracters in this movie show a diversity of creatures, one more vulnarable than the other, but all trying to survive in a world (at that time, the sixties) where being gay was not concidered as normal as it is now. Chiem made a real good movie, just like he can write great comedies. i am sure he made this movie with a smile as well!