Review of Mysterious Skin (2005) by Steph O — 06 Oct 2010

Wow. It may be disturbing, confronting, and really hard to watch at times - but "Mysterious Skin" is an amazing movie. It's about two boys (now teenagers) who were in the same little league baseball team when they were younger, and who both know that something horrible happened to them at that age.

The difference is, one knows he was molested by his baseball coach - and seems to think of it as his first sexual experience. (Neil has known he was gay for a long time, and we are lead to believe young Neil thought that on some level, what was happening was okay). The other boy can't remember anything that happened, save for the occasional flashes of memory from that time. So he believes he was abducted by aliens. As they grow up, the first boy Neil (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) spins more and more out of control. He works as a male prostitute, he does drugs, and is basically completely messed up. But in a way, so is the second boy - Brian (Brady Corbet).

Brian is a bit of a nerd, and lives with his over-protective mother - who acts as if Brian is still 8 years old. Brian has become obsessed with the idea of alien abduction and desperately tries to figure out what happened to him when he was a kid. He finds out that Neil was also in his baseball team all those years ago, and feels like Neil must know what happened. Like Neil was there with him, even.

As I mentioned, "Mysterious Skin" is really hard to watch at times. But it's so powerful and the performances are... wow. That's all I can say. Joseph Gordon-Levitt did an excellent job at inhabiting what I'm sure was a really difficult role, and Brady Corbet is also great as the polar opposite to Gordon-Levitt's character. Jeff Licon, who played Neil's friend (and eventually Brian's friend too) was also a highlight. I put off watching this movie for a long time, because I don't know if you can ever really be in the mood to watch a movie with such a horrific subject matter... but I'm glad I watched it. So well written, so well acted, and I don't think I'll be able to get it out of my head for a long time.

Another awesome thing about "Mysterious Skin" is that you can see where the ending's going from miles away, but that doesn't affect the movie negatively. I was genuinely interested in seeing that ending play out, because I was already so invested in the story and so interested in the characters. It really is a unique experience, watching this movie.