Les agitateurs

Horseplay

In a post gay world where pornography is ubiquitous only gay characters strongly imbedded in a believable story evoke any homo-eroticism. This was like a throw back to any Andy Warhol movie of the 60's.

The camera work was good but I could see much believable acting.

It's juxtaposition of laddish behaviour and suppressed sexual desire lacked heft or direction. The story was at best vestigial. I saw little to laugh at at and any reason for why this group of boys were imprisoned in this house.

Quite frankly I was bored from start to finish.

It a 2 outta 10 from me, meaning skip this drivel!

The eye candy is fantastic! However there was no movement in the plot in the first 90% of the film. Random talking, silly conversations that go nowhere. Need to do more character development and movement of the plot line. The last 5 minutes were the best, and many of the actors have potential to show their depth, such as in the ending, but the entire movie was overrun by useless conversation of a bunch of tough guys. These are honestly talented actors, and some are extremely good looking, but need to show more one-on-one interactions, thoughts, feelings etc. They are there but in very minute quantities.

I thought of Marco Berger in quite a positive light after seeing two of his films, The Blonde One (2019), and Hawaii (2013). Both were excellent. Both were mature works, and visually interesting, with very engaging plot lines.

Having since watched The Carnival (2021), Young Hunter (2020), Taekwondo (2016), and this film, I've pretty much changed my mind about this director.

I thought Taekwondo was extremely slow moving and boring, with little to no discernible plot. Horseplay follows in the footsteps of Taekwondo, but with a bit more sexy visual confection (which is really the only reason I even assigned it the extra star.). There are definitely some sexy guys, and sexy scenes. But it doesn't offer much more.

Okay, actually, the vacation house where all this horseplay takes place is pretty to look at too.

But the movie seems to go on and on, magically making 1 hour 40 minutes seem like about 6 hours. The dialog is vapid, and repetitive.

It's filled with testosterone, but has virtually no substance.

There might almost be a couple of plots hidden in this film, but they're so well hidden that they cannot be seen. When you think there might be a story line starting to materialize, it invariably turns out to be a red herring that goes nowhere. A quiet gay man amongst a group of rambunctious young friends who constantly insult each other by calling each other "homo," while taking endless pictures of themselves engaging in gay sex (horseplay, I guess)? The sexual violation of a girl visiting the house, against her will, by one of the guys? Nope. The leaking of an embarrassing "homo" image of one of the guys whose wife sees it and worries her family will be defamed on social media? Those didn't go anywhere.

There is one searing moment at the end of the film that might hint at a story line. But hey, everyone's gone home, and the credits are rolling.

If all you're looking for are some glimpses of young guys at their sexual summit, you might enjoy this. But even there, there's just so much boredom in between that it's not really worth it.

Horseplay is just a remake of Taekwondo, but with more nudity and homoerotic moments. There are identifiable themes emerging from the horsing around, but none of these were explored. Therefore, it leaves the film lacking in substance. I believe the person who made Taekwondo is responsible for Horseply, so I am at a loss as to why they would make a similar film without building the characters or explore the hinted themes to build a narrative that is relateable and teachabe! To be honest, I have seen adult films with better plots. So watch for the eye-candies and not for the storyline because one doesn't exist.

How is this not "Taekwondo" all over again? Marco Berger's gay male gaze is still here, not as facefront as it is in "Taekwondo", but there's still plenty of that in here. Something that's not very prominent in here is his usual slow-burn sense of longing. There are some characters that struggle throughout the movie but their struggles are various, not only same-sex attraction. Or are they? I enjoyed watching this, I love everything Berger does, he owns me, but for me it's one of his weaker films. "Horseplay" is what straight dudes do to fool around and it's not that exciting of a movie. Marco Berger still needs to make more movies.