Looking for something a bit different I found this on Netflix streaming movies. Clean and interesting.The setting is summer camp, filmed in Georgia. There is a history at this camp, bullies will take a target kid to a small island in the lake, called "Goat Island", them strip them and abandon them. In this story we have two campers who get stranded at the same time, a boy Chandler Canterbury, probably about 12 during filming, as Howie, and a girl Annalise Basso, about the same age, as Grace. Both of them wear glasses and get picked on by the older kids.Grace is almost hiding, shivering, wondering what to do, but Howie is different, he encounters her and right away devises a plan to get off the island and take a hike through the woods. Grace can't swim so he gets a large dry tree branch to act as a float for her and off they go.More than anything this is a coming of age story for the two kids, forced to use their wits to get down the road, to find something to wear, something to eat, places to sleep. Through the experience they become best of friends, and eventually picked up by parents.SPOILERS: It turns out Howie was an orphan, he had a rough young life and didn't look forward to going back there. He and Grace kept in contact, she got a letter that he was adopted by a nice family, it seems things are turning out well for both of them.

Wow, I thought I was strict - I almost didn't watch this after reading that one reviewer thought this was vile, sensual, and perverted. Nonsense. We don't watch R-rated movies in our home and I am very active in the LDS faith, I didn't see anything wrong with this movie. My daughters (14 and 11) and I watched this together and I am so glad I did. The empathy and thought this story invokes are necessary and welcome in this day and age where bullying and the simple social class tension is very prevalent. The ability to see situations and people in a different light is heralded as this story of teenage conflict unfolds. I was impressed with the acting of these two young stars and I feel in love with their courage and resolve to survive a demeaning prank. I've never read the book it is based on - The Goats by Brock Cole. My daughters both liked it a lot, though the older thought it was a bit cheesy. I thought it was heartwarming and I'm 50 :).

D.J. Caruso's Standing Up was a movie I thought was going to be horrible from the very beginning. It takes place at night one mile off of a campsite where a girl named Grace (played by Annalise Basso) and a boy named Howie (played by chandler Canterbury) get forced to be naked by a few camp mates who actually took their clothes off ( perfect for a bad beginning) and go inside to a sort of abandoned building in order to seek shelter and are on a worthless survival adventure when Grace's mom (played by Radha Mitchell) is on a wild goose chase just trying to find her daughter and her fellow companion. Everything about this movie is totally stupid, The performances are weak, the dialogue is unnecessary as well as unintentionally hilarious in one scene, the screenplay tries so hard to demonstrate itself when it acts as if it can't and it is too lazy to do so, the directing is floppy, and the one person who gives the stupidest performance throughout the entire movie was unfortunately Val Kilmer who just played a drunken cop in which the 2 stranded nerds thought was going to bring them to the worried mother, but then refers to the goat smell in the back of his SUV, and stops at his house by the excuse of that he id going to get something when he is really calling his boss to get them reported. As Elizabeth Taylor said in Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf? "It's a flop, a great big flop" which is exactly what this film really was.

This movie is sweet and heartfelt. The two leads are beyond adorable and charming and if they so chose they could have done nothing else, but they don't don't rely on their charm to tell you their story. They each show you how their characters are tough, scared, outcast and united; All of these things that you aren't sure children can feel so keenly. They teach the audience how kids think and they tell you that cruelty (even unintentional cruelty) can really hurt and shape how a person behaves. The starting plot is sad and makes you really feel for their characters but the two kids quickly show you that they can handle what the world throws at them and you forget the harsh melancholy that overcame you. Their independence and confidence grows as the movie goes on as does their comfort with each other.The setting is beautiful; the camp sites are full of colour and lush nature that just seems so serene and peaceful. You don't find yourself worrying for these kids as they travel through the undergrowth because they've proved that they can take care of themselves but you do root for whatever it is they want to come from this. I phrase it that way because the kids don't really seem to want anything tangible; they just want to stay together. And who can blame them? They are the only two people at camp who know what they have been through (humiliation, hunger, etc.) and before this experience they were each alone.Its really an amazing story because you see how the two grow to rely on each other and by the end of the film they have broken down the wall of just plain politeness/cold truce because they really care for each other and are very invested in each others lives. The ending wraps up the story nicely (something changed from the novel "The Goats" on which this was based) and you just know that these two kids will be all right.Overall, I was impressed with the adaptation and I would watch it again and again and again. 9/10