Throw aside any expectations that Marly Morrison’s Sweetheart will be an achingly Gen Z teen zeitgeist movie and embrace the fact that it belongs to the classic British genre of sexually awkward teen meets nightmare seaside family holiday. Go with it because that is what makes its humiliating inevitability so sweet.
April Jane or AJ (Nell Barlow) as she prefers to be known is smart enough to provide three indisputable proof points that the world is not flat at the drop of her floppy hat. However, she still has that dumb teen insecurity that she needs to exaggerate to make herself seem more interesting. Sullenly hiding in a security blanket of baggy clothes she gets dragged to the seaside for a short break where family fun is mandated by mum.
AJ is just hitting the hump where her family have got their head around her being gay but have not yet accepted she won’t become a Portia de Rossi/Jodie Foster femme with a cute haircut and an immaculate lip. AJ herself does not know who she is becoming and proves it by sabotaging every opportunity she has to meet the girl of her dreams. The girl in question is Isla, lithe and lovely with all the expected attributes of an on-screen female lifeguard, Isla (Ella-Rae Smith) puts the babe in Baywatch. As it’s a movie about British people everyone, including mum, gets way too drunk. It leads to truths being told, secrets being revealed, and passions being released. Also, shame, liberation, and hangovers should teach lessons but never do. |
It’s sweet, funny, and familiar in a good way bringing back all the awkward horrors of teen angst with fondness. If you don’t manage to learn its central lesson about being yourself at least remember the three reasons why the earth cannot be flat. It’s important.
Queerguru Contributing Editor ANDREW HEBDEN is a MEDIA & CULTURAL STUDIES graduate spending his career between London, Beijing and NYC as an expert in media and social trends. As part of the expanding minimalist FIRE movement he recently returned to the UK and lives in Soho. He devotes as much time as possible to the movies, theatre and the gym. His favorite thing is to try something (anything) new every day.
Labels: 2021, Andrew Hebden, BFI Flare, coming of age, coming out, drama
