Boys Don't Cry

Boys Don't Cry was a major success with the critics and the Academy Award's, so I looked forward to seeing it. Easily one of the best films of the past year, Boys Don't Cry is a moving experience that deserved all the credit it got, and then some.

The film takes for its source material the true story of Brandon Teena (Hilary Swank), a girl who, well, just wants to be a boy. A sex-changing (getting her hair cut and sticking a dildo down her pants) credit sequence sees our hero(ine) at first on the pull, duping a local girl into a bit of nookie, and then on the run, when the truth about her sexuality rears its bizarre head. A fugitive of the law, as well as a few irate townsfolk, a twist of fate leads to her befriending a bunch of trailer-trash misfits and, temporarily, enjoying a new-found freedom under her manly guise. Of course, it's all going to go horribly wrong - particularly when she falls in love with the local girlie sweetheart (Chloe Sevigny).

Chloe Sevigny, who plays the girl Brandon falls in love with, deserved to win an Academy Award. Her performance still lives in my memory, and it has been some time since I first saw Boys Don't Cry. Hilary Swank, who did receive an Oscar, pulls off an absolute barnstormer of a performance as Brandon Teena, it is easily one of the boldest and most memorable performances I saw in the 20th century. Kimberley Pierce is also another stand-out, she is in the director's chair, and she hardly got any praise for her amazing effort that she put into this film. I applaud everyone involved in Boys Don't Cry, even the one's who got little credit, particularly Brendan Sexton III (who plays a trouble-making misfit) and Andy Bienen (co-writer).

Groundbreaking performances and a brilliant debut directing effort make this film unmissable.

I rate Boys Don't Cry 9 out of 10.

"Boys Don't Cry" is a recreation of the later years of Brandon Teena, who was raped and murdered along with two others. It seems that Brandon was trans...and hoped to surgically become a man one day. In the meantime, he lived his life as a man and fell in with some truly awful people....the 'friends' who ultimately ended up committing these awful hate crimes.

Considering the case made national headlines and won kudos from critics and the Oscars, the story is a bit surprising. Instead of making Brandon some sort of saint or hero, he is shown as a rather screwed up young person...not that in any way am I blaming the victims for the godawful crimes committed against them. But it clearly is a 'warts and all' portrayal of Brandon.

So is the film any good? Well, yes, it's well constructed and well acted. However, some might not enjoy watching a film where most everyone is easy to dislike. Some others might not want to see it because it is very unpleasant towards the end. After all, the story culminates in a rape and multiple murder! It is certainly NOT for everyone and is tough to watch. Fortunately, the attacks aren't as vividly shown in the movie as they could have been and the director showed some restraint...but it's still godawful to watch.

So is this film right for you? Well, that's something you'll have to decide for yourself.

This is not the story of a woman living as a man, because that would imply that this woman merely dressed up and fooled people. That's not at all what's going on.

This is the story of a male who thought male, felt male, and WAS male, but looked down at the body God gave him, and saw that of a female. It's not homosexuality, or cross-dressing. The name given to it, in the film, is Sexual Identity Crisis, but I don't really think it's a crisis. I don't think there's anything wrong with Brandon Teena, or Teena Brandon, thinking that. It is merely who he is.

And this movie did make me think about it, and that is its success. Powerful at times, repulsive at times, those whose lives this story affected may not approve of the final film, but it can still open the eyes of people toward things in this world that they previously might not have understood... which may help the next Brandon find and keep happiness in his or her life.

Worth seeing, but not for the weak of stomach or easily offended.

I was stunned by the simplicity and power of this fine film. It tells the true and tragic story of Teena Brandon/Brandon Teena, a woman living as a man in a small town in Nebraska. No matter what your personal opinions may be, this film does not preach. It tells the story in a matter-of-fact, honest and gritty way, but leaves you shaking your head in shock that such anger and hatred exists in these modern times, for someone who is "different" merely because of their sexual preference.

Relative newcomer Hilary Swank gives a heartfelt and courageous performance as Brandon. I say courageous not only because of the subject matter, but also because she is able to strip away her youthful, movie star glamour and become the character she plays. She is entirely convincing. Also, she shows a tremendous amount of guts for being able to get through the gut-wrenchingly violent rape scene. This was a brave choice, and a wise one.

Chloe Sevigny plays Lana, the girl Brandon loves. She is the only person who truly understands Brandon. Brandon finds himself in a world of drunken trailer trash and convicted felons. No one is free from guilt, but there is always the unspoken sin of being different. Hilary Swank and Chloe Sevigny play their tastefully erotic love scenes without seeming self-conscious. So many actors of their generation might be afraid to tackle these types of roles, but they do their jobs with aplomb.

The film was another that haunted me the day after seeing it. Kimberly Peirce manages to make a simple film about a very difficult subject, and she doesn't resort to Hollywood gloss or preachiness. It is a risky film, very difficult to watch in places, with several very violent and disturbing scenes. It is a story that needs to be told, and with the two Oscar-nominated performances from Ms. Swank and Ms. Sevigny, it succeeds.

The mark of a great film is that it conveys real feeling to an audience without having to explain everything by the numbers. This film achieves that, obviously. It has deeply moved anyone with even half a heart. Unfortunately, the subject matter of this film is SO unfamiliar to most people, that many have no understanding of what it was about. That's not their fault, nor Ms. Peirce's since had she spelled it all out to us, what we would have seen was a competent TV-type movie of the week, instead of a powerhouse of a film that touches us to the depths of our souls. But I think after reading so many of the reviews here at IMDB, some important facts should be understood.

Brandon was not a "male impersonator" or a lesbian, or crazy. He was a pre-operative female-to-male transsexual. That is, he was a male before the necessary physical transition that a transsexual goes through (ie. hormones and surgery) before he can be "officially" be declared a man. He was not a liar. He was a walking contradiction. He was as much a man as he would have been had he had the chance to undergo the biological and surgical transition. Because his body had not caught up with his mind, it's understandable that many people are confused about this. But hopefully, this fact will help audiences understand the confusion that Brandon felt. He was raised to believe, like all of us are, that what decides a person's gender is their anatomy, so the fact that his body was a lie to him all his life made it nearly impossible to live with the contradiction of what he organically knew to be the truth in his mind. Once he finally expressed his true self to the world by donning the physical appearance of 'Brandon', he could no longer go back to being 'Teena'. The cat was out of the bag. Imagine yourself as a man who knows that in order to not live a "lie" he must be called "Teena" and dress as a female every day of his life in order to join the workforce or socialize with other people. Once he'd fully established himself as the man he was, he could not subject himself to 'female drag', for what would have been numerous years for him (sex reassignment surgery costs tens of thousands of dollars and takes one to three years, once the process is started).

A reviewer here wrote "why Brandon chose to live there (Nebraska) with her lifestyle is beyond me." I'd like to kindly explain to this viewer and others who share the same sentiment that the answer to that puzzler is that Brandon was not a "her" and his reality was not a "lifestyle". Many people 'disagree' with this very fact. Thus, it is understandable that had Brandon gone to San Francisco, Paris, or Timbuktu, he would have confronted the same confusion and frustration, and unfortunately hostility and violence, no matter where he went. There are simply millions of people who do not understand transsexualism, thus it is common that their confusion leads to simply believing that it is the transsexual who is confused. I am not blaming anyone for these sentiments. It's only in recent years (mostly thanks to the internet) that there has been detailed study of female-to-male transsexualism. There are millions of female-to-male transsexuals throughout the world, and sadly most of them have suffered much of the pain that Brandon suffered until they became aware that they were not alone. Had the internet been available to Brandon during his lifetime, he would have had an opportunity to see that he was not alone, and that there were others like him who could lend him their support and guidance.

I'm most grateful to Ms. Peirce for making such a brave and deeply touching film, and I hope that viewers will, whether they understand Brandon or not, find an even deeper layer of tolerance for people who are quite different from themselves.