Beach Rats

As the summer film season has waned, it is time for the independent market to attempt to showcase their films that have deemed quality so they can continue to produce their respective films. The 'rights of passage' films have been played out on the silver screen for quite some time now and with that, we have "Beach Rats" in the offing to ponder and study.

On the outskirts of Brooklyn, Frankie (Harris Dickinson), an aimless teenager, suffocates under the oppressive glare cast by his family, mostly his mother, Donna (Kate Hodge) and a toxic group of delinquent buddies. Struggling with his own identity, Frankie begins to scour hookup online sites for older men. When his chatting and web-camming intensify, he begins meeting men at a nearby cruising beach while simultaneously entering into a cautious relationship with a young woman, Simone (Madeline Weinstein). As Frankie struggles to reconcile his competing desire, his decisions leave him hurtling toward irreparable consequences. Through this process that Frankie must take, he with have to endure, fear, anger, confusion, frustration and desperation in order to keep his head above water at all.

Others to round out the cast are Neal Huff as Joe, Nicole Flyus as Carla, Frankie's younger sister, Frank Hakaj as Nick, David Ivanov as Alexei, Anton Selyaninov as Jesse and Harrison Sheehan as Jeremy.
 
This was exquisitely well written and directed by Eliza Hittman ("It Felt Like Love" '13) plus shorts. You know this is interesting when it won awards at the Sundance Film Festival. So with that, I simply had to see what the hubbub was all about. This is the quintessential delineated character study well dissected by Hittman. Where she truly shines is in her ability to direct. The multi-layered, three-dimensional emotional instability Dickinson conveyed was stunning and truly believable, and this is fine directing at its finest. The writing, although was well played out, had some slow areas that sort of hanged in places, by otherwise this story was compelling and one could really feel the pain this young man was going through. You could cut the confusion and frustration with a dull butter knife, and the more he attempted at correcting his situation, the deeper the water he was approaching into. Hittman doesn't have a ton of experience, but this will certainly open up more doors to produce more films in which to showcase her abilities to create.

As I've mentioned in other reviews, you aren't seeing this for the entertainment package as much as for the craft of the film. Could Dickinson receive a possible Oscar nod come that time. Not sure--it's a bit too early to conclude, but his performance was so convincing that it definitely has Oscar written all over it. This is not made for the mass audience appeal, but when and if you see this, it will make one cringe considering all that happens to this guy.

Out of 4 Stars: 3.5                              Rated: R                                 98mins.