This Film is as simple as it can and should be. The situation is becoming more and more common. A teenager, a junior in his high school, discovers little by little he is attracted to men. He has a girl friend who would like the relation to go all the way, but he does not bring it there which makes him start wondering.Then he is thrown into the gay world by accident, the way most things happen in life. His first man is a sweet and maybe slightly weak predator, a senior in his high school, and a colleague at his summer workplace. The young junior falls and the senior goes to college in September. Eric will have to live alone with his recollection, his desire and the demand from his mother and society to have a normal life with a girl friend and all the rest that goes along with it. Maggie will play what she still does not know is a game.Then all that happens is accidental till it becomes a real choice. Later he will run away from a straight party when he is called a queer because he dances in a rather exuberant way. He goes to a gay night club or bar where he meets someone. The next stage later on will be to run after his first male lover and to get it finished physically and emotionally: right through to the end of the physical act and to the final closure of the emotional experience.Then he will try to go back to a normal straight life and have a night with his girl friend, Maggie. But in the morning he will feel no satisfaction, no fulfillment. He will know then lying is no solution and he will move towards telling his mother and then going back to where he finds his full both physical and emotional nourishment.The film is then interesting because it describes the slow change that occurs in Eric with total sympathy and even empathy. Eric is living what practically all human beings have lived or deserve living: the slow awakening of desire and search for satisfaction of that desire, the desire to be appealing to someone else, the desire to answer to the ones who are appealing to him, the desire to feel happy and satisfied when he meets with that mutual appeal which is first of all a strong emotion that becomes a passion. Then the physical act is like natural.This is not typical of gay men, but any man feels that transformation no matter who is the object of the nascent passion. I guess it is also the same thing for women though the film does not insist on the case of the Lesbian friend of Eric's and only shows the deception and frustration of Maggie when she realizes her appeal has been hijacked by Eric.This film insists on the role of the mother that moves from open hostility to acceptance without the know-how required by such a disquieting situation. If the mother accepts her son's choice, she will have to defend him and it when confronted to the dubitative hostility of other parents, not to speak of the open hostility of other teenagers, some school officials, PTA members, church representatives, etc.A good film on the problem and necessity to come out as soon as the appeal starts moving in you, though you need a confident, an accomplice, someone who understands and supports you in that transformation. Coming out is hard.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU

I saw this movie many moons ago, but have not been aware of this medium for commenting on it. I adore this movie, it was my life. Eric's discovery of his sexuality one summer while working at Cedar Point in Sandusky Ohio is almost exactly how I discovered mine. I thought as I watched it that someone had stolen my journal, wrote a script about it, and then silently returned it without my knowing. Eric's first love. His making friends at a bar he was not old enough to be in. His developing style, in the way many of us did in the 80's, bad hair and worse clothes, but great music.I could relate to this movie on so many levels. I think that any gay man that found himself in the 80's should watch this film and see where they fit into it. If this movie doesn't remind you of yourself, it is sure to remind you of someone you know.Loved it!

Great movie, punk and 80's style runs rampant. An interesting note for those who may have heard of Cedar Point the amusement park near Sandusky, Ohio. The movie was partially filmed there, the teens have summer jobs in the park in the 80's. Brought back wonderful memories to me, I grew up going there every summer. It was also an all around beautiful and touching movie showing the struggle of growing up knowing you are different. And not quite knowing how or why or where to go next until you meet someone also different. It gives the individuals inside us all encouragement to be well... an individual. It's being able to be yourself.

Brilliantly thought-out... I can tell you what any character is thinking at any point in the movie. Not that it's so simple and obvious, in fact there are several things that I missed the first (and second) time through. What I'm getting at, is that the dialogue and the emotions are realistically written and perfectly performed.Shot on-location in Sandusky, this film gives plenty of opportunities for an Ohioan like me to say "I've been there!" and adds another dimension of realism. The only thing about the movie that disappointed me was that so many things were left uncertain at the end; but maybe the point is supposed to be that a "coming-of-age" story is never really finished.