This is your typical indie coming-of-age tale about a teenager, though it’s clearly working with a very tiny budget. Set within a migrant family living in Southern California’s Coachella Valley, the movie digs into how fragile old-school traditions and expectations can be. We follow a teenage son as he goes through the process of coming out and struggles to find acceptance while dealing with homophobia, domestic abuse, and a messy love triangle that involves his own sister. Goyo is seventeen and just about to graduate from high school. Since he’s been a bit more feminine since he was a little kid, he’s always had to deal with emotional and physical transition from his dad, Ramon, who is obsessed with him being "a man." The only real love he gets is from a lady next door who actually respects him for who he is. The family lives in a Mexican community where everyone works on a grape farm, but things get shaken up when a new guy named Lucio arrives. Lucio basically seduces Goyo ...
Tom's boyfriend Guillaume is dead and his funeral is being held in his hometown. A town of farmers in a town which is in middle of nowhere. Guillaume's mother didn't know he was gay and his psychotic brother Francis threatens Tom to make sure it stays that way. Francis is handsome but scary at the same time. Tom makes up the story that Guillaume had a girlfriend and couldn't make it to funeral. Francis assaults Tom both in bed and in a toilet cubicle, threatening him with more considerably more grievous harm if he reveals the true nature of his relationship with Guillaume. Soon the game begins where Part of Tom wants to leave the farm but he is also enchanted by the life style. He is scared of Francis but then there is also something about him that attracts him. He accepts Francis' abuse for nothing. But when Sara arrives (Tom's friend and supposedly Guillaume's girlfriend), things change. Sara tries to put some sense into Tom but he is somehow blinded by everything. But son he finds out the truth on how dangerous Francis can be and how he needs to be careful for his own life. Finally Tom manages to escape the farm life prison from Francis and run for life.
The characters are interesting. They're strong. But I couldn't understand the basis of their actions. There is a scene when characters are doing this, and the next they're changing, and then they're going back, and then they make a new thing. Why does Guilaume's mother bursts out in hysterical laughter after Tom quotes some perverse language from the imaginary girlfriend. What does Francis really want from Tom? He doesn't want him to tell his brother's secret but why does he want Tom to stay? Is it because of his loneliness, the fact that he is stuck with his mother or is it that he may himself have some homoerotic feelings towards Tom. Its never clear. Its shown that most people in the village do not like Francis and his family but again its not clear on reason. The story that Tom finds out in the end is scary but is that the entire truth or there is more to it? Tom does manage to leave the farm but everything in the story is left completely unresolved.
It has some homoeroticism but thats not enough to hold someone's attention. (4/10)
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