Review of Love, Simon (2018) by Moses H — 23 Mar 2018

I was excited about this movie and I wanted to like it despite the cheesy trailer, but it fell short. Love, Simon very much felt like a movie created by straight people for a straight audience so they could feel all liberal and progressive about themselves. This didn't feel real to me. Everything was generic. Everything was so generic that nothing about this movie felt specific to the queer experience-even coming out was framed as merely an example of a universal experience. Most infuriatingly vapid was the film's central metaphor, that being gay is like a ferris wheel because life has its ups and downs. The film's creators were clearly trying hard to make their straight audience identify with Simon, which is all well and good, but this easy identification comes at the expense of any truth or complexity in the story. Straight people may watch this and feel that they understand the gay experience because they too have their ups and downs and they too sometimes find it difficult to open up to people, but the gayness in Love, Simon is incredibly superficial. Most gays are not white, upper-middle class, suburban boys with two progressive parents and a little sister. I am all of those things, just like Simon, and yet I still found myself utterly unable to identify with him. There was nothing to identify with. His character had no substance. The other characters were no better.

I'm glad that Hollywood has finally decided that it can sufficiently profit off gay people and allies for gay films to be a profitable endeavor, but the film industry can do better.

One final note-I've heard this referred to as a romcom, but this film was neither particularly romantic nor a comedy. The jokes are sparse and seemed to be designed for a straight audience, just like the rest of the movie.