Love, Simon

March 9, 20185 min
DF-08349 – Nick Robinson stars as Simon in Twentieth Century Fox’s LOVE, SIMON. Photo Credit: Ben Rothstein.

As someone who goes to the movies way too often I see a lot of the same stories re-told. It is easy for me to relate to them as a white heterosexual male because throughout the history of film it is my story that has been told over and over again. Never did I think of all the people whose stories were not being told, because I thought the central ideas were for everyone. It is only over the last few years have I realized the importance for seeing a viewpoint that is told through different eyes, so that other people can see their lives on screen as well.

“Love, Simon” is just such a story and I am so glad it can be told this way. Simon (Nick Robinson) is your everyday good looking high school kid, but with a secret. You see Simon is gay, but he has told no one. He has a group of friends in Leah (Katherine Langford), Nick (Jorge Lendeborg Jr.), and Abby (Alexandra Shipp) who he does everything with , but he just doesn’t want things to change so he keeps his secret. That changes when another student in school writes an anonymous post on the difficulties in being gay and telling no one. Simon sees the opportunity to meet someone like him and like an old fashion 90’s romantic comedy, he starts to exchange emails with this stranger. When it comes to knowing who this person is there are only little hints and soon Simon starts to guess who it might be. Everything changes though when another student sees the emails and outs Simon to the world. First Simon is angry then accepts that he is who he is, but will the secret he kept for so long cost him his friends and the stranger he loves?

As I left the theater I thought about how much I enjoyed the story, but I had my problems with it as well. Mainly I didn’t like the lack of conflict, that in the sense when Simon was outed there was nothing like the harsh reality that is life. As I have been away from it I realize how stupid that thought might sound because there is rarely conflict in a movie like this. I was looking at this as a gay romantic comedy, when in reality this is just a romantic comedy , and a pretty good one at that. Writers Elizabeth Berger and Isaac Aptaker adapt the story from Becky Albertalli’s novel and present it as it is , a love story between two people. Life you see is about finding those moments that make you feel good and a story like this does just that. As the movie goes on and the way the situations unfold, you are left with that satisfaction that comes with other rom-coms. I love what I saw, and everything plays out in an entertaining way, something “Love, Simon” lands an almost every turn. So even though Valentine’s Day has come and gone, go to the movies this weekend and fall in love again with movie that just does it right.

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