Lee Eisenberg When we think of LGBT cinema, we usually think of men in drag, or stories of the community collectively overcoming hardship. Andrew Haigh's "Weekend" is a different one. While it does focus on the characters' sexual orientation, it's more about the subtlety in the characters' lives and how they seek fulfillment. The movie makes sure to create complex, relatable characters, so that we can always feel for them. It's not the greatest movie ever made, but one that prompts the viewer to think deeply about the characters, empathizing with them.I recommend it.

samuelhodder Contains spoilers...After all the praise that has been given to this film, I was surprised by finding myself becoming so bored by it I struggled to make it to the end.The film consists of two broadly uninteresting people having mostly downbeat and unoriginal conversations. One, Glenn, is a 24 year old aspiring artist, though what we learn about the quality of his mind and the limited range of his consistently solipsistic thinking suggests he will be without success. He complains that straight people aren't interested enough in hearing about gay sex, that if he did a show about him talking about gay sex then straight people wouldn't come, that there aren't enough gay story lines on TV, that heterosexuality is shoved in his face, that marriage is too conformist, that gays are too pigeon– holed etc ad nauseum. And many other things the average gay man will have heard expressed 100 times before, with as little depth. Glen's friends hold him back, he thinks, seeing him only as he used to be, whereas he feels he is constantly changing. He hates Nottingham. He doesn't want a boyfriend.The protagonist, Russell, is more endearing and essentially likable, but most of the time words need to be dragged from him, sometimes in a mumble. His relationship with his best friend Jamie is much dwelt upon, but when together he barely holds a conversation with him. He maintains a habit of writing down his depressing sexual encounters with closeted or cheating or just unhappy men. Several of these are later read out, Glen and Russell taking in turns.Most of the film takes place inside Russell's small and dreary flat. The director's choice of a washed out colour palette of grey and blue compounds the dreariness. Outside, people shuffle up concrete paths. Russell lives there in a vacuum. Glen has some friends, but from what little we see of them, they are neither interesting or pleasant and he doesn't like them much. Really there is little of anything in their lives. What others found deeply romantic, I experienced more as claustrophobic and was unconvinced by the depth of foundations of the connection. Both characters are lonely and slightly unhappy and fancy each other. But it was easy to imagine the relationship being broken off, whether or not Glen does ultimately go to Portland (the film's only plot point). The most exciting thing they do together is have a backie on a bike.The sex is believable and unerotic, to my mind at least, and even the drugs are no fun. In this film taking large amounts of cocaine only makes people crave gloomy and irritable conversations with each other; I would suggest another dealer. These men in their mid 20s talk a great deal about whether and when they feel embarrassed or ashamed to be gay, and about coming out and the extent to which they are out. Which hasn't been my own experience of what English gay men in their mid 20s talk about with each other (yes, I've been one). As well as a lack of plot, there is no cinematography to speak of that could be described as filmic. It could easily be made for TV, except there's deliberate camera shakiness and blurring. There's little in the way of a soundtrack. The film is very well acted; the leads play their parts convincingly, it's the characters that lack interest. There is most of the time a strong sense of verisimilitude. And that has been the biggest source of praise for the film. But filming people talking on a bus would also have a sense of verisimilitude. The question is what would be the point? Where is the creativity? Are the leads being gay sufficient justification for the film? I certainly don't feel it told me anything about life, or made me see life in a slightly new way. The sense it brought to mind was of being stuck in a corner at a disappointing and dingy house party, being spoken to at length by someone dull, but being in two minds whether to leave yet as it's a long journey home and I'm not yet drunk, so I hang around.

Joel Rogers British independent film at its best, first of all I liked that Andrew, Chris & Tom really tore the script to pieces and just went for it which explains the organic feel to the film. Once in a blue moon a film really engages your attention and this film does, there is a beautiful subtleness to it that is really out of the norm in many films with both Tom & Chris giving believable performances. It makes a refreshing change to watch a film that is actually realistic and could easily happen, which you can't say to every film out there. What's great about this film is the smaller details with many scenes showing the bits inbetween a typical day not just the big ta-dah moment like many other films show, I just love the pace of the film.

Silitonga Almost 2014 and I don't find any gay themes movies as good as "Weekend". And it's still the biggest jump for gay theme movies since "Milk" in 2008 and "A Single Man" in 2009 made it (according to After Elton's ranking) as a year released debut.Even far more from back, "Weekend" still the biggest jump for independent and limited gay theme movies since "Shelter" in 2007 shocked the world. Even many high rated independent and limited gay theme movies like, "Were the World Mine" (2008), "Patrik, Age 1.5" (2008), GLAAD awards winning "Noah's Arc: Jumping The Broom" (2008), and "Undertow" (2009) can't talk much. "Shelter" still in top chart now replace "Brokeback Mountain".I don't wanna talk about how good "Weekend" is, because everything just perfect, acting, story, cinematography, and emotion just in a perfect shape and I'm sure everybody mostly will agree with me.I just wanna show that everybody really (REALLY) hungry for a good, no, A GREAT gay theme movie, but unfortunately it's still really rare to find. We don't know when a great epic like "Brokeback Mountain" will exist or worse maybe there aren't like "Brokeback Mountain" no more.I hope, 2014 will be great again.