It's okay to dislike this movie. Really.

Rating: 4/10 (31 March 2006)

Before I say anything else, I have to get out here first that I have nothing at all against homosexuals. I have a gay friend and a bisexual friend. I have seen the Oscars and heard wonderful things about this movie, so I was eager to watch it. Unfortunately, I feel I must have seen a different movie than everyone else did! This movie was...boring. I have a fairly high boring tolerance, if I feel like there's a reason for it, like dramatic tension. However, this movie just seemed very long, and the plot meandered endlessly. At times I wondered if there was a plot. It mostly seemed concerned with Jack and Ennis having a difficult time scheduling times to sleep together.
Another thing that bothered me was, well, Jack and Ennis. There was never a time that I wasn't painfully aware that Ledger and Gyllenhaal are both very very straight young men. There was little chemistry between them, and the love scenes were very forced. They also were very abusive and unlikeable- frankly I didn't care when Jack was killed because, if you sleep around with married people (straight or not) you're going to make people angry. I felt as if I were gay, I would have been offended at this representation of my life. You're going to hate me for this, but I found Robin Williams and Nathan Lane in The Birdcage to be a much more sympathetic gay couple. Sure they were stereotypically flamboyant, but you could believe that they LOVED each other. Portraying a gay couple as sex-crazed monsters is in poor taste, in my opinion.
So, there's my two cents' worth. Most people will probably check that it was "unhelpful" if they loved this movie, but this is not for them. After seeing 8 pages of gushing reviews (and not seeing more, because I gave up) I thought I should write a little something to let others like me know that it's not just them.