Slash

I wouldn't pay too much attention to the extremely positive reviews for this movie on here. It's certainly not that good, on the contrary I thought it was boring, slow and repetitive. As for the comedy I can't say I laughed a lot, maybe a forced grin or two, but that's about it. It's just one of those movies you hoped would be good but as soon as you start watching it you realize you're wasting your time again. The acting wasn't that bad, the story was though, uninteresting and predictable.

"I don't want to wake up in a year and stab my parents to death with a kitchen knife."

"Well that makes one of us." (dialog, Michael Johnston talking to Hannah Marks at the 1:01 timestamp.)

Despite the relatively low IMDb score, Slash 2016 is a joy.

If you read the third-party reviews, you will note a tug of war between critics who think it is some form of uber-social commentary, and those who look at it as a sweet and engaging love story or rom-com.

The answer is probably somewhere in the middle, but this reviewer was more engaged by the teen rom-com.

For two reasons.

One, because the "classic" age of the teen rom-com seems to have passed -- remember Freddie Prinze? -- and this genre is neither as popular as it once was, nor as well done. Two, because that aspect of the film does not merely work, it actually spreads its wings and soars.

Credit writer/director Clay Liford for getting this recipe right. As I have noted in other reviews, a lot of what used to considered movie fare is now being done on TV, and a lot of the more personal creative work we used to see on some TV shows is migrating to film.

The dialog at the top of this review is typical of the film -- sharp, funny, and oddly reminiscent of the old Woody Allen rom-coms (with Johnston doing the neurotic Woody character, and Marks doing a wonderful collage of Diane Keaton liberally mixed with early Angelina Jolie.)

Marks is the revelation in the film. For these rom-coms to work (and this one does) she has to go beyond merely playing a character, she has to be (for the male viewer) every idiosyncratic girl in high-school that you wanted to get to know better -- but didn't.

Marks engages, holds the attention, and carries the film. An actress to watch down the road.

Recommended.

I was in the mood for a laugh...

So I put on what I thought would be a 'Dick & Fart' comedy.

This film started slow, and to be honest I almost switched it off after 5mins. Glad I didn't!

What ensued was a surprisingly good 'coming of age' teen drama with a twist... a tastefully flavoured art film that touches on the rather intriguing subject matter of erotic fan-fiction.

The casting and performance of Hannah Marks is exceptional and she is sure to star in future dramatic films as she has shown a maturity and class throughout this enjoyable film.

I saw Slash at BAM Cinemafest 2016 last night. It was certainly a crowd-pleaser. The story starts as "innocent, studious, repressed 15-year-old boy meets wild, unruly, sassy girl" and goes from there. It could take many directions, but it chooses a realistic, rather unsure and zigzaggy route, which reflects perfectly the confusion and indecision of the coming-of-age state. I expected the highlights to be the bad fan fic being read out loud awkwardly and the imagined sexual encounters of the burly sci-fi hero, Vanguard, but though these were all extremely hilarious and entertaining, I was surprised to find the emotional scenes about belonging, friendship, love, betrayal also vibrant and smart. The leads are great. Jessie Ennis rocks!

A film that showed me slash fiction and the whole nerd course teen women take to find "acceptable" ways of exploring sexual feelings whether producing or consuming it, and how it is important that parents should fully provide a beneficial support; whereas many male teens are able to explore their feelings from mainstream to Victoria's Secret catalogues without penalty. The film also inserts scenes of popular notions of what the majority thinks of teen culture and exploring sexuality from Julia's sex-obsessed friends and Neil's oddly normal parents. At least his older sister challenges gender assumptions and social ideas about masculinity and femininity. Very good performance from Teen Wolf alum Michael Johnston and Hannah Marks from Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency. This is a smart, compassionate coming of age story, as LA Times writer Katie Walsh says "The nerd-sexy tale the Internet age so desperately needs." Its a delightful feature from writer-director Clay Liford (Earthling) with a oft-misunderstood high school student who thinks he's the only one to pen online homoerotic vignettes that center on his favorite character from a sci-fi series and a titillating classmate who treats him with enthusiasm that's so infectious. Also, Michael Ian Black in a memorable cameo graciously defending Neil at the Houston Comic Con's Rabbit Hole when he's exposed as under-age while reading an excerpt. It grabs me in my gut occasionally but it's infectious with much-needed counterpoint to the view that fanficcers are nothing but talentless deviants.