Cast: Arye Gross, Eric Schweig, Tim DeKay, Louise Fletcher, George Coe, Nan Martin, O'Neal Compton, Corinne Bohrer. Screenplay: Thomas Bezuch. Cinematography: Rob Sweeney. Production design: Stephanie Carroll. Film editing: Andrew London. Music: Joseph Conlan.
Big Eden is a queer romantic fantasy, or maybe daydream. You make it big in the city and return to the small town where you grew up in the closet, and you discover that everyone not only tolerates your queerness but is happy to facilitate it. And you find that your handsome best friend, on whom you had a crush, has returned too, and is now willing to make a go of it with you. But you turn him down because you realize that he's still straight. (Yeah, right.) And then, when you're about to return to the big city, you discover that an even better-looking man has been carrying the torch for you all these years but was too shy to make a move. Happy ending. This utter nonsense might have worked as a movie if writer-director Thomas Bezucha had found the right tone for it, but he meanders between moodiness and quirkiness, and is unable to come up with dialogue that strikes the right note and even sometimes to make sense. Moreover, he has miscast the central role with the otherwise capable character actor Arye Gross, who has none of the charisma that would make us believe that either the old friend (Tim DeKay) or the secret admirer (Eric Schweig) are pining for his affections. And what's a romance without sex and passion, which never show up on screen except in a couple of tepid kisses? The only thing Big Eden succeeds at is demonstrating that queer people can make romantic movies that are as improbable as the ones straight people make.
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