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 ...
Maurice, a reticent young homeless man, somehow manages to get by in Brooklyn; he spends his nights in parked cars until he finds himself at Bizarre, an underground club renowned for its burlesque shows. Maurice is fascinated by the club’s playful revues celebrating self-determined sexuality and creative otherness, and the two female club owners both adore him. He soon becomes a part of their self-selected family, and begins to bond with introverted Luka, who also works in the same place. But Maurice turns his back on Luka’s growing affection. There is a bit of jealousy when Luka gives in to Maurice’s straight friend who fucks anything that moves. Luka just cannot understand what is Maurice’s feelings towards him. Running away from his true emotions he drifts aimlessly through the city and in his boxing club. Unable to withstand the pressure of his repressed feelings, Maurice unleashes a mounting foment of emotions, pervaded by tenderness and menace. There is apparently some back story which we are never told about.
There are so many things that are ‘bizarre’ about this film. why did the girls end up approaching a random stranger to work with them and even live with them is a mystery. Luka, who forgets his keys one night, sleeps with Maurice but next thing we know is that he is pretty much moved in with him. What is Maurice’s past? Are the lesbian couple in open relationship or just teasing Maurice because he is so charmingly cute! We don’t know. Logic is not really the strong point of this film, for sure. The film is trying to not take any stand for anything; be it Maurice’s sexuality or other queer members, who strangely all have a double life. Maurice’s character is loosely defined and lack of no proper story track around him makes this film about nothing at all. Having said these, I thought the performances of all the actors was quite believable. They were god and yes Maurice was damn god looking in a twin sort of way. There are too many burlesque routines in the film, although few of them good, have absolutely nothing to do with the plot. The dialogues are minimal and most important events are captured via loud background music.
All we have here is yet another gay themed tragedy that is ‘bizarre’ in true sense, a senseless odd film with a very attractive lead character for eye candy. (2.5/10)
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are you serious about the sequel? run! run! run!