Bridegroom

I had the privilege of seeing Bridegroom at the Little Rock Film Festival this year where it won the Best Documentary Audience Award. (By the way it also won the Audience Award at Tribeca, Toronto, Los Angeles and Memphis!) Little did I expect to experience the range of emotions I felt at the screening of this excellent film.

A moving testament of love and friendship found by two young men from small-town America, it deftly showcases the many issues involved in marriage equality when one of the young men meets an untimely death.

The results are devastating as we see the results of marriage INEQUALITY rear its ugly head. We feel the pain in a shattered relationship. Nevertheless, the movie ends with a victorious comeback for the surviving half of this enduring love.

Bridegroom is the best, and most moving documentary I have ever seen. It has the feel of an Oscar winning narrative feature. Well worth the effort to see, you will never forget this friendship that blossomed into a lifeline of love for two lonely souls.

I rate this documentary a 10 out of 10.

I watched Bridegroom tonight in Netflix. I have to admit I cried my eyes out. I highly recommend everyone to watch this documentary. Toms and Shanes love is so pure you can just see it through their videos and photos. Its the type of love that everyone wants. Hopefully this documentary will open up the eyes and the hearts of many people and they will learn to accept who they are and who their friends and family members are. Doesn't matter if you are gay or straight. Life is too short. Love the people that love you back and enjoy your life. Get a camera and record all your amazing moments. Thank you Shane and Tom for showing the world what true love is like.

I had followed Mr. Crone's story on YouTube so I was prepared with a package of tissues when I went to the premiere. What I was not prepared for was the amazing amount of humor captured in the first half of the film. It completely disarmed my tension, and made the remarkable connection between these two men that much sweeter. The story of what happens to this couple is,for me, is as moving as the very special love they shared - their connection, their love of life, their strength, and the against-so-many-odds fact that they found each other, if only for a short while.

This film is a gift.

(I would have rated it 10 but for two edits that were so jarring I was taken out of the experience momentarily during the viewing - both came off like mid-sentence interruptions to the speaker being cut-away from)

A bona fide tearjerker! I am oblivious of Shane's youtube videos, which kickstarts this feature- length picture, but the film needs to be seen by literally everyone, whether for or against the same sex equity, it is deeply heartfelt and perspicaciously educational, I think whoever as long as hold a small fraction of mercy in their hearts, regardless of their religious convictions, after watching this film, it will be a game-changer for the prejudiced and a touchstone for a mightier love above social class, creed, race, color and gender.

The documentary is about Shane and Tom, a gay couple being together for 6 years until Tom died of falling from a rooftop accidentally in 2011 (aged 29), the interviewers (Shane, his families and their friends) chart the story of their lives from Shane's childhood, his bullied school days and his struggling self-identification of being a gay man while Tom attended a first-rate high school albeit his blue-collar family background, and turned out to be an all-American boy, handsome, macho, outgoing, a role model excels both in sports and academy. After fate let them meet in L.A., their relationship epitomizes the most desiring lover-cum-soulmate perfection one could ever dream of, which causes the ensuing tragedy far more harrowing to bear.

A familiar juncture for almost every gay person, the coming-out process, particularly to Tom's parochial family, it was an incubus, which sheerly contrasts with the understandable reaction from Shane's family, however, it is all evinced secondhand by Shane and their friends, since Tom's family adopted the silent treatment to the invitation of the production team to be part of the film, surely we will never know the story from the other side, which is a minor glitch in this otherwise viscerally affecting picture.

Nevertheless, a more contingent fact is how the young soul's passing provoked much more indignation when Tom's family flagrantly shut down Shane out of the funeral and expunged their entire life together as if it never happened, it is an atrocious transgression towards our very basic canon as human beings, it is love unites us, differentiates us and sublimates us from other creatures on earth, and propels our society to move on to a better world, so even though BRIDEGROOM (which is Tom's family name, what a pertinent one!) is hardly a ground-breaking piece of art work (SMS interaction, video footages, travel photography is all it has to render the narrative aside common interviews with apt editing), it is a film should not be missed and I do hope the cost of a young life can be at least in some level compensated by awakening more conservative minds to evaluate the world with a more humane mind and encouraging more individuals to embrace their true color. Also, best wishes to Shane, you are lucky enough to experience true love and don't lose hope, live long and prosper!

Still brings tears to my eyes thinking about Shane and knowing he's somewhere out there today still filled with discomfort in the loss of his best friend and companion. Very emotional and hard to wrap your head around just how intense of an emotion that would be to endure. The message is conveyed very well, and the majority of the film is just building up to a very strong climax. At the turn of events the film becomes very emotional and a strong tear jerker.

Over-all the movie is A++ but hard to watch because it is very very sad! I have seen many fictional romance movies with sad endings, but when the story is true, it can really take to heart just how powerful a story Shane has to share.