The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green (2005)

I watched the first 45 minutes of this film and decided to cut my loses. As a film studies graduate, its extremely rare for me to not watch a film in its entirety, I don't like the nagging, lingering question that arises sometimes after only seeing half a film; "I wonder what happened in the end?" With regards to this film, I honestly don't care how it ended. A romantic comedy that is neither funny nor romantic. I couldn't even force half a smile at any of the jokes.This film breaks the most basic fundamental rule of storytelling; the audience needs to feel empathy, affection and support for the central protagonist. I could not invest in the character Ethan Green at all, I felt no interest in his 2 dimensional life whatsoever.The plot is farcical, the narrative is all over the place and the acting is wooden and amateur.Avoid, avoid, avoid.

26-year-old gay man fears he will never find true happiness after a series of romantic dumps and cast-offs have led him back into the arms of his ex-boyfriend, who is currently preparing for a commitment ceremony to his lover, a stuffy gay Republican. With both a bombastic sense of satire and an unbroken string of snotty quips, "Ethan Green" never even approaches becoming a fabulous same-sex romantic comedy. Openly gay cartoonist Eric Orner surely didn't mean for his popular comic strip series to become yet another angst-in-the-boudoir farce, formulated around a carousel of failed gay relationships. None of the immature central characters are willing to think outside the box; they are picky, petulant, and boring (even with their shirts off). At one point, the protagonist (rather incredibly) doles out some seasoned dating advice in a scene scored with a plaintive piano. It is the height of ridiculousness that such a bald-faced attempt to tickle a gay audience with the usual shallow conceits like flashes of skin and bitchy banter should suddenly turn introspective. The fickle nature of gay love is addressed continually--which is predictable considering the filmmakers are not interested in seeing a relationship through. To the people who made this movie, commitment is viewed as the end of the line; the comedic thrust of the material is all in the early coupling. I think they got it backwards. *1/2 from ****

The movie was never trying to be ground breaking or amazing. its a light hilarious movie with broad generalizations that everyone can identify with. Anyone who gives this movie a low rating was looking for too much. Why cant we make a movie for fun sake? Not every gay movie has to try to better our position in the world. This is a movie that could have come from a group of gay guys sitting around joking and laughing about the day to day grind of our lives. I would recommend it to anyone tired of the epic Greek tragedy of most gay films. For some reason every gay film has to have drug use, Pain and most often the death and or beating of one if not all of the people in it. For once we have a gay movie that takes a lighter view of our FABULOUS way of life.

Someone listed a bit of trivia on this site that this film was shot in less than 2 weeks--and it's not hard to believe. Movie makers should have left well enough alone than to try to turn an intermittently read 4-panel comic strip into a full-length film with a plot. This is like a series of sketches from "The Three Stooges" strung together--and it makes "The Three Stooges" look like Shakespearean actors.As if the gay community hasn't had its fill of these kinds of films complete with the usual gamut of clichéd characters (the confused one, the gay Republican, the eternally horny twink, and of course, transvestites), here's another.There's some loose plot about trying to sabotage the sale of a house, a cheesy commitment ceremony gone awry, requisite numerous sexual encounters most of which aren't even remotely romantic or titillating, and of course, the predictable "boy gets back together with his ex" ending.Perhaps I'm older than the intended audience for this film, but I viewed it with a handful of 20-something gay men, and they weren't very amused by it either. The only reason I'm not giving it the lowest rating is because of "The Hat Sisters". Clichéd or not, they were the highlight of the film--and that may or may not be a compliment.