Film Review: Boy Erased Redefines What Is Faith And Family
Watching Boy Erased, I felt a different kind of sadness. Throughout the film, you see how religiosity warps certain parents into becoming the killers of their children’s spirits rather than their keepers. Boy Erased discusses LGBTQ discrimination and prejudice by confronting how humanity constructs, from social standards to religious rules, its own misery.
Usually, when discussing acts of prejudice or discrimination, we tend to talk about the ignorance of those who purport such positions/ acts. Yet, Boy Erased shows the plain idiocy of allowing darkness to disrupt your life. No “good” belief invites bad things into your life, your heart, and your family. Yet, in “faith” to God, the Eamons family allows trauma to enter their once happy, healthy home. All they had to do was accept their son’s sexuality. Think about that! All they had to do was accept that his sexual/ romantic partners would be male. Yet, they couldn’t, and with that one decisions comes a series of gut-wrenching ones that nearly tear a united family to the brink of irreparability.
Brilliantly and quietly directed, starred, and adapted by Joel Edgerton, Boy Erased is based off of Garrard Conley’s memoir, and you cannot help but want to personally intervene in certain scenes. Lucas Hedges is so smart as Jared. He makes him noble, respectful, and brightly observant of his surrounding, but he is cautious at speaking up against injustice because he adores his parents. Nicole Kidman as Nancy Eamons and Russell Crowe as Marshall Eamons are phenomenal in displaying the road to hell is paved with good intentions. They truly love their child, but, in believing he is an abomination to God’s love, they send him on a path of pain that will take him YEARS to heal. This path leads him to a gay conversion program led by Victor Sykes (Joel Edgerton).
Edgerton turns Sykes into a sniveling, duplicitous adult. I mention that he is an “adult” because he is leading children into self-loathing and torture sessions veiled as “exorcisms.” You wonder what kind of grown man would create such a “facility,” and seek to wound young hearts. Thus, near the end, the film reveals Sykes is married to his husband and ended his program. This “nice, little fact” alters how you approach Sykes psychological torment, particularly towards Britton Sear’s Cameron. In hating himself, Sykes pushed a boy into destroying himself because you can only “love thy neighbor as you love yourself.”
Honestly, each of Boy Erased’s characters/ kids such as, Jesse LaTourette’s Sara, Troye Sivan’s Gary, Emily Hinkler’s Lee, and Xavier Dolan’s Jon are worth their own film/ story. Even in passing, you want to know more about these bright, witty children that are being inexcusably dimmed because of their “sexuality.” Every time they enter Sykes’ facility, you feel your heart palpitate because you know they are going to walk out sadder.Watching Hedges grasp and amplify Jared’s growing depression is deeply disturbing. Frankly, I am surprised Jared had the strength to move on from this ordeal, move out of his parents’ home, and make a life for himself and husband as a successful writer.
I, literally, found myself praying, during the film, that Jared end up in New York being fabulous, prosperous, and in love with a handsome man. Admittedly, I sighed in relief when it was so, but that is not the end of the film. Boy Erased feels divided between life before, during, and after gay conversion conversion therapy, which makes sense because a trauma does alter how you define your life. While he is able to move on from what happened to him, he cannot move forward because his parents still struggle with his sexuality.
Before this ordeal, Jared is happy but hidden. During it, he is unhappy and hidden. After it, he is healing but seen. Frankly, I would prefer that last option over any. How unlimitedly happy can you be if a part of you is hidden away? More importantly, how unconditionally loved can you be if a part of you remains forcefully unseen? This question permeates the final act of Boy Erased as Hedges’ Jared, Crowe’s Marshall, and Kidman’s Nancy must grow up in order to stay together, which is an incredibly powerful thought. While we all know that, in life, we will change, those that choose to love us will have to grow in order to remain loving towards us. Boy Erased Comes Out On November 2.
