G.B.F. (2013)

I was supposed to review A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night but my internet has been super slow so I couldn’t stream Netflix. So, instead, I’m reviewing a movie I watched with my sister earlier this week so I’ve got SOMETHING for you guys. Sorry!

G.B.F. (2013)
 Dir. Darren Stein
 Writ. George Northy
 Stars: Michael J. Willett, Paul Iacono
 Rated R (But I still don't know why? I'd rate it PG-13)
 92 mins. 
 Comedy, Queer
 IMDB 6.0

Okay, so I’m going to preface this with saying I’m so sorry about the vampire movie thing, I’ll do my best to get back into it, but until my internet stops being too slow to even load a gif, I can’t really stream movies.

Now! G.B.F. I’ve got to say, I’ve heard a lot of good things about this movie in the past but never wanted to watch it. However, there is a dearth of light, happy, enjoyable queer movies in existence, nonetheless on Netflix, so I wasn’t incredibly bummed she wanted to watch it. It was worth watching, that was for sure.

G.B.F. tells the story of a gay boy named Tanner (Michael J. Willett) who gets accidentally outed when his friend Brent (Paul Iancono) decides he wants to come out and become the newest, hottest accessory for the most popular and most beautiful Queen Bees at the school: a Gay Best Friend. Tanner, who is not the stereotypical fabulous gay, is forced to go along with the scheme because it’s the only way he can escape getting the crap beat out of him by the jocks at the school, and he knows that demeaning himself into being an accessory for a popular girl is better than being gay-bashed. The three top popular girls at the school that are competing for Tanner’s attention are Fawcett (Sasha Pieterse), ‘Shley (Andrea Bowen), and Caprice (Xosha Roquemore).

From the get go, I was so put off by the popular girls just by their names alone. Caprice is fine, but Fawcett??? This pretty blonde girl is named after a bathroom appliance. It’s so over the top and just annoying for some reason. Same with Ashley the redheaded Mormon girl who goes by the name ‘Shley’ because that’s trendy, I guess. Instead, it just drives me crazy. It’s so lame. Who would do that to themselves and why? It’s frustrating, and I realize that these girls’ names are supposed to be ridiculous, but it’s just so obnoxious, in my opinion.

I was also very annoyed by the fact that Fawcett had this little foray into actually being very smart and caring about Tanner, and it was touched on a tiny bit at the end, but it still wasn’t really ever gone into in any way that makes her seem like less than a vapid jerk.

But, all those negatives aside, I really did end up enjoying the movie. High school is hard for everybody, especially closeted kids (trust me, I’d know), and I liked the overall relationship between Tanner and Brent and how their friendship fell apart due to the situation Brent got them into. Sophie was a fun character as well, though I felt like Glenn was kind of just there. I also enjoyed the Mormon kids’ entire role in the movie. I loved Shley’s closeted boyfriend trying his hardest to hook up with any gay kid he could and ‘get it out of my system’. It was hilarious. And Brent in general was just amazing. His mother was also incredible. I loved their relationship as well.

The story was very Mean Girls meets 4th Man Out, but not as good or funny as either of those. However, the acting was all pretty great and the writing wasn’t absolutely cringe-worthy. So all in all, it wasn’t a bad movie at all. It was definitely worth watching. I recommend it to anybody who wants a queer film that’ll make you laugh and isn’t absolutely terrible.

My Rating: 7/10