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Trailers...

  • Oxygen Masks Will (Not) Drop Automatically
  • Life Inside Me (A)
  • Love Me Tender
  • Doin' It
  • Thirty Years with the Whip
  • Compulsion
  • Inside Amir
  • Peter Hujar's Day
  • Captive (The)
  • Constantinopoliad
  • Weapons
  • Follies
  • I Have Never Been on an Airplane
  • Nova 78'
  • Alexina B. Composing Lives
  • Long Road to the Director's Chair (The)
  • Griffin in Summer
  • Girls & Boys
  • Premiere (The)
  • Unforgivable
  • Wayward
  • Cutaways
  • My Sunnyside
  • Brigitte’s Planet B
  • How Far Does The Dark Go?
  • Brief History of the LGBT+ Press in Brazil (A)
  • Internal Comms
  • Ghost Empire § Mauritius-Chagos
  • Mothers, Lovers and Others
  • Labyrinth of Lost Boys
  • Gunyo Cholo: The Dress
  • Days of August
  • Chica Quinqui
  • After the Hunt
  • Desire Lines
  • History of Two Warriors
  • Einfach machen - She-Punks von 1977 bis heute
  • Couture
  • Out Standing
  • History of Sound (The)

Speech & Debate

Country: USA, Language: English, 105 mins

  • Director: Dan Harris
  • Writer: Stephen Karam
  • Producer: Tom Rice

CGiii Comment

Journalism relies on morals, ethics and honesty...so says a teacher who refuses to endorse a Gay/Straight Alliance on the grounds that it is more of a social event than a legitimate school-club!

This a might little film that seems to have slipped [shamefully] under the gay media's radar! Undeservedly [and, negligently] so!

A light-hearted approach to some seriously BIG issues...censorship, puritanism...and, the transference of errant [adult] opinion onto and into younger [dangerously impressionable] minds!

A trio of misfits...the gay, the geek and the precocious...demand their young voices and opinions to be heard...their approach may be a little unconventional...but, it will certainly put a smile upon your old wizzened faces!

It's been 13 years since Dan Harris sat in the director's chair...and, alas, the rustiness is all too evident. There is a little staggering and a few mis-steps along the way...

Hallelujah for Sarah Steele, a powder-keg of talent and charisma...she captures that fine line between being likable and unlikable perfectly - her two sidekicks sidekick admirably. But, it really is her film...and in being so, her character needed much more depth.

Aaaah but there are the obvious constraints...time and money! With a little bit more time, Harris could have mulled over whether this film should have been a fully-committed musical [that it screamingly wanted to be] or, the film it became...with a few partly-performed songs thrown in to keep things going at a jaunty pace! Ooops!

That said...it's a refreshing, entertaining [even, uplifting] little film that deserves to be seen by an audience, young and old, opinionated and impressionable...and, by the censorious and puritanical!

Smile:)


Trailer...

The(ir) Blurb...

Frustrated by the hypocrisy they see in their parents, teachers, and the entire school board, an unlikely trio set out to find a common truth and make their voices heard as they revive a defunct school club and take on the world.

Cast & Characters

Liam James as Solomon;
Sarah Steele as Diwata;
Austin P. McKenzie as Howie;
Roger Bart as Principal Bellingham;
Janeane Garofalo as Marie;
Wendi McLendon-Covey as Joan;
Kal Penn as James;
Kimberly Williams-Paisley as Susan;
Skylar Astin as Walter Healy;
Lin-Manuel Miranda as The Genie;
Sarah Baker as Miss Riggi;
Lucy DeVito as Lucy;
Ryan Lee as Mark;
Jeremy Rowley as Gary Crenshaw;
Logan Shroyer as Hot Debater