Philophobia snuck up on me as a fresh take on the Final Days of High School/Stuck in a Small Town movie. The actors in this movie are certain to make the jump to American cinema soon. The film captures the messiness of high school romances, the casual violence of childhood, and the anxieties of growing up middle class in modern England. It has the feel of an English Hot Summer Nights. In fact, there are enough similarities between the plots that I would recommend them as companion films for your consideration.
The idyllic country side, the angsty brooding at end of year parties, the pervy way that Kai stares at half-dressed girls through his window in the dark (from the first shot of the film through on til the end) all feel like throwbacks to simpler time, when the worst thing that could happen to you in your senior year is a love triangle.
The movie is not without flaws. There’s a domestic violence plot that is deployed throughout mostly to demonstrate how nice of a guy Kai is and how vulnerable his neighbor Grace is. The English teacher is a poster boy for not respecting boundaries: he congratulates Kai for getting with one of the students he teaches, calling her the “second hottest girl at school”; he smokes weed with Kai after a hard day at school; but probably the worst is how he makes Kai think that the final exams in high school will matter in five years. The only thing that really saves their relationship is the fact that they’re both straight males. Behavior that would be totally unacceptable if they were cross-gender is somehow neutralized.
The film has a habit of over-explaining moments of high drama by having its protagonist literally circle the word to describe the moment in a dictionary he carries around with him everywhere. Once in a while, a character will read from the dictionary in an inappropriate page of the book (half way through while talking about a word that begins with the letter A) so that we have some variation.
All in all, one of my favorite from the festival.
