Purely Joyful Movie!

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

What happens when you take two unattractive gay men and stick them in the redwoods with plunky music and flowing rivers? Why they fall in lust of course but then they have to part BUT they promise to reunite in one special spot in 5 years. And we all know those promises. Anyway, back to reality. 5 years later the cousin shows up with a box of memories and bad news about lung cancer. Well they had to kill one of them off eventually to make the silly story and laughable script end with more goo. Honestly, this was pure corn.

I'm not Jewish, but I'll use a Yiddish term here. Does anyone know the meaning of "schmaltz"? The definition is "excessive sentimentality, esp. in music or movies", and there was plenty of excessive sentimentality going around in Redwoods.The story revolves around two gay characters, one being a stuck-in-a-rut type guy (Bradley) whose relationship is going nowhere, and the other being a "lost soul" (Montgomery) trying to find himself. Montgomery's character Chase tries to find the nearest B&B to finish his book and gets lost on the wrong street. He asks for directions from Everett and while giving directions, there is a spark and the two eventually fall in love. This is so wrong, because a) it happens too quickly, and b) Everett is already in a relationship.While Everett's partner and son are away, Chase and Everett spend a lot of time together and then Everett's partner calls and says he's coming back early. The relationship between Chase and Everett has to end abruptly but they make a point to meet at the same place at the same time, 5 years from now. Unfortnately Chase doesn't make it back (he has a good reason) and then we get the schmaltzy ending.Redwoods is nice, scenery wise, but is full of cheesy acting and moments where there is too much silence or not enough movement to keep the viewer interested. Parts of it are slow and poorly acted. With a better cast and supporting characters, this could have been a really good gay tear-jerker but it falls short of that due to characters who don't put their heart and soul into their roles.I've seen lots of gay-themed movies, and this one falls way down the list near the bottom, right above "And Then Came Summer". If you want to get all verklempt, skip this one and watch "Prayers for Bobby", then you'll know what good acting is.

I've seen all four of the movies that this writer/director has written and they are all strangely compelling. So much so that I'll continue to follow his work and hope that he continues to improve.When I was much younger I would cross a set of taconite dotted railroad tracks on the way to school. Taconite is a rough form of iron ore that contains valuable iron ore but in quantities so small that it was once deemed uneconomical to mine.Thinking of this writer/director's work reminded me of that ore. There is good stuff here but with the abundance of other, more readily appreciated, options available today, most will fail to see the value in this.This time around there were a number of adorable characters that had really sweet moments and some wonderful plot points surfaced that had great potential. But there were also a number of flaws that might have been fixed if the writer and director had been two separate people with individual perspectives.It might be stretching things to call this a "diamond in the rough" but there were definitely brilliant, touching moments in this film. Enough so that I enjoyed it when I wasn't considering the "might have beens."Personally, I've always been a bit fascinated by the taconite and I'll continue to follow this guy's work. Hopefully as his work becomes more refined, I'll find it even more compelling.

WARNING: This review contains major SPOILERS!! I just finished watching this movie and I have to say overall I liked it. I think Shelter is a better gay/romance movie though. The scenery in Redwoods is very beautiful, and I really really like Brendan Bradley. Matthew Montgomery grew on me as the film went on. My complaints are the following: The music is totally hokey. There were some scenes that were supposed to be kinda light-hearted moments and the music was really cartoonish during these scenes and I found it to be really distracting. There was a lot of times where I thought the character's actions and dialog seemed a bit unnatural. Some of the things that the characters said and did didn't seem realistic to me. Especially the scene where the mother tells the son about her own long ago extra-marital indiscretions. I don't believe that conversation would ever have really happened. I think she should have offered advice to the son and then maybe we could have seen her looking at the man's hidden picture and reading a secret love letter from long ago to show that she understands what the son is going through. After she tells him about the affair he asks, "Do you still think of him?" and I couldn't help but roll my eyes and say back "Obviously she does or she wouldn't be talking about him now years later." Everett and Chase have an argument that seems to come out of nowhere and then they suddenly decide they are so angry and frustrated with each other and the situation that they just have to go lay down right that moment and take a nap. Everett's brother strips completely naked in the middle of a conversation after the family dinner I guess he is some kind of exhibitionist but what importance was it to the story?? And would someone just strip down while talking to their brother like that? It is never explained why Everett returns to Miles after packing his bag and leaving to find Chase. He finds Chase and the viewer is lead to believe they will run off together but the next scene (5 years later) and Everett is still with cold as ice and uptight Miles. (What the hell?) I can only guess he stays for the little boy but have these people never heard of shared custody? There are two scenes of completely gratuitous full frontal male nudity such as the one mentioned above, the other when Miles throws his robe off and then stands naked while he nags Everett about clipping his toenails over the carpet and griping over mold in the shower. The scene does show how uptight and trite Miles is but he didn't need to be naked. I felt the two nude scenes only succeeded in cheapening the film as a whole. I'm no prude, and I'll be the first to admit that I enjoy some nice male eye candy, but it just didn't seem to fit in here. It was kinda random. I was actually disappointed that it was even shown. The writer/director , David Lewis, obviously didn't believe in his own film enough, it was like he felt he had to throw in the nudity to get attention. I know it sounds like I didn't like this movie, but I did. The characters Everett and Chase are both very likable and the actors have good chemistry. I fault the writer/director for any of things I didn't like. I look forward to seeing Brendan Bradley in other films. =)