Lovesusti The Worst Film Ever

Voxitype Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Fatma Suarez The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Sarita Rafferty There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

Marko This movie offered a promise of an unusual plot. That is where it stops. Even if you convince yourself that such a combination of characters and events could exist in real life, you will soon be disappointed with stiff acting, slow pace, unwanted scenes of symbolic dreams and too many flashbacks, jumping forward, more flash backs and more dreams. It all gets mixed up to the extent that you are not sure are we 'now', before, or before-before. All the stereotypes are there: a gay priest, butch female prison chief, an orphan with a history of sexual abuse, sadistic inmates, a hypocritical bishop, a dying brother, several shower scenes and a bloody ending. You get bombarded with improbabilities every step of the way: a boutique prison with less than 20 inmates, a love story between a prison guard and an inmate with regular sex in a prison cell, unexplained resurrection of a guy beaten to pulp whose skull was smashed against a solid ceramic sink, breaking it in two pieces, mysterious injection which knocks you out for two weeks and you wake up perfectly fit, a prison chief firing her staff on a request of an inmate janitor, and so on. I could not help myself thinking that most actors are gay friends of the movie directors/scriptwriters. If they were not effeminate, they were certainly too soft and unconvincing in their 'butch' roles. The main villain is simply boring. The only original moment in the movie was mercy killing by the priest. Hey, why use readily available lethal dose of morphine, and euthanize your dearest one quickly and painlessly, when we can drown them by force in a very unpleasant way and extend their agony? Finally, the ending -- famous ending of almost every gay-themed movie that I have ever seen... you guessed! It was not a happy one. However, there were plenty of scenes featuring dreamy green meadows, sunshine over idyllic towns and white clouds flying in the blue blue sky forever...

showtrmp This prison drama was recently described on the message boards as "tragedy porn", and I can't think of a more appropriate term. No one in "Release" suggests a human being; all of them are sociological constructs designed for yet another demonstration of the waste and meaninglessness of life, a la Clint Eastwood. This is the kind of movie in which as soon as you see the female warden (Dymphna Skehill, whose performance consists of chewing her tongue while keeping her lips clamped together) proudly hang a framed certification on the wall, you know it's going to be smashed. (Authority is a sham!) And, topping even that, an inmate can't just be stabbed--he has to be stabbed with a sharpened crucifix! (Religion is all hypocrisy!). And so on, and so on. The story concerns a priest, Father Gillie (Daniel Brockleback) who has been jailed for ambiguous reasons and is suspected by the other inmates of pedophilia, which sets off a near-psychotic reaction in his teenage roommate (Wayne Vigo), a victim of abuse and (possibly) rape. Gillie is persecuted by almost the entire prison, led by Max (Bernie Hodges), and his only solace comes in a love affair with one of the guards (Gerry Summers, who is very appealing but seems too sensitive to have passed the screening process). Surprisingly, this affair is the element that comes off most believably, mostly due to the personal charm and naturalness of Brockleback and Summers. But with this setup, there's really nowhere to go but down, and everyone works very hard to make all the ghastly events that follow seem "inevitable"and "tragic". Unfortunately, we're given far too much time to think about all the implausibilities--such as why everyone listens to Max in the first place? We're told he's the unofficial leader of the prison, but we never feel it, especially since Hodges is the kind of actor who tries to seem "sinister" by whispering all his lines. And we're just supposed to accept that Vigo is "unstable", which explains why he's so easily manipulated into precipitating the final crisis.Why is it that the movies that strive the most to be "gritty" and "realistic" come off as the most contrived? Wake up, filmmakers--"life is unfair" is not a daring or original message, and it won't come as a big surprise to the majority of moviegoers. When someone works this hard to pound us over the head with bitter truths, the glossiest old 1940s MGM musical seems a model of naturalism by comparison.

dacha68 Possible spoiler alert.I must say that I am not always moved by a movie. I watch, I move on. Not so with this movie. I became so interested, so wrapped up, so invested in the characters and story that when the ending came and it was not what I was hoping for I was literally moved to frustration. This movie did what a good movie does. It got you wrapped up in the story and the characters and led you on an emotional ride. I come from an island where homosexuality and the homosexual lifestyle is still a crime and punishable. Parts of this story resonated with me because I was told the exact same thing that the priest in the movie told the main character. This is a movie well worth seeing. All I can say is "Well done, well done"!

treborlodge This film represents another departure from the norm in gay themed films. It is a tough love film with striking images and sequences that allow the viewer to fill in the elliptically presented representation of prison life versus Catholic ideology and the controversy surrounding the red hot issue of euthanasia. I won't pretend that I found it an easy watch because it isn't - what it is however is a cleverly constructed narrative that twists time with flashbacks and fantasy sequences that underpin the main thrust of the story. I was left after seeing this film with a greater understanding and sense of the pain of love that exists between gay men especially when coupled with the contemporary issues explored. It has probably not sat well with gay audiences because it is a film that is more than the usual gay fare. It has a strength of determination to it's approach that borrows with ease from well known films that are much loved and critical exemplars. Given that the budget was so low it is amazing what has been pulled off in this film. Some of the cast clearly were relying on intuition when it came to their performances but the leads are seasoned professional and recognisable actors whose performances were not reduced by the amateurs supporting them - moreover it added an authenticity to the emotional journey. I wasn't sure what to expect but more importantly I wasn't disappointed. Very interesting film. It was great to see a lengthy complimentary "making of" on the DVD which revealed an earnest engagement from all involved but also a great sense of fun whilst making it..good for them.