Boy Erased is a film based on Garrard Conley’s memoir of the same name and is the story of a preacher’s son who is sent to a gay conversion program after an incident occurs while he’s away at college.
Boy Erased is the story of Jared (Lucas Hedges) who, after moving away to college, has his sexuality exposed to his mother and strict preacher father and is subsequently sent away to a gay conversion program where he can be ‘cured’. Nicole Kidman plays Jared’s mother Nancy who is struggling to find the right way to handle the situation she has found herself in – stuck between her son and her husband. Kidman plays Nancy as a warm and loving figure, who tries her best to hold her family together as it threatens to fall apart. Russell Crowe plays Jared’s strict preacher father, Marshall, who we see significantly less of than I would have expected. Marshall is more a reactionary character only coming in and out of Jared’s story to give his opinion or share dialogue before disappearing only to be spoken about in third person through Jared and his mother.
Lastly, Joel Edgerton plays Dr Sykes who is the leader and coordinator of the conversion program. We see Dr Sykes quite a lot throughout the film and his practices and attitudes seem to be one of the main focuses of the film, second only to Jared’s feelings and experiences. Edgerton plays this character really well – reserved unless provoked into exploding, coercive but comforting. If his portrayal of an incredibly sincere and almost charming religious leader is a realistic portrayal than it is intimidating to see how easily parents and even some of the young people put into these programs are convinced to believe in people like him and what they are teaching.
One of the most notable things about Boy Erased is the talented team that have been involved in the film’s creation; from Joel Edgerton not only acting but also directing and producing, to an incredibly strong leading cast of Hedges, Kidman and Crowe, it easy to see how and why so many talented people lent their hand to the telling of this story in the hopes to give the film more weight and spread further awareness of the truth within its content. However, having so many talented, ‘big names’ in the film did result in some of the secondary actors seeming underused. For example, both Troye Sivan and Xavier Dolan are incredibly talented queer actors and given the content of the story I was hoping to see them in bigger or more substantial roles.
For a film that clocks in at just under two hours but focuses predominantly on a two-week period while Jared’s at the gay conversion program, it is clear the focus of the film is supposed to be not only Jared’s emotional journey with his family as well as himself, but also the external things he sees and experiences while he’s participating in the program. In an attempt to avoid spoilers, I won’t go into detail about what happens while he’s there, however the main takeaway is that all of the young people there are told they need to be ‘cured’ of their homosexuality. They are physically and psychologically challenged and are made to believe that it is for their own good, the sooner they ‘become straight’ the sooner they get to go home. Boy Erased seems to have a strong message for the audience about the cruelty of these programs, cemented further by an end credit scene that tells the audience that fay conversion programs like this are still legal in 36 States of the United States at the time of filming. It is clear that Boy Erased is less for ‘entertainment’ and more for educating the audience about something they may not have even known was happening, yet something that now needs to end.
Overall Boy Erased is a relatively sad and quiet story; it’s not flashy nor is there a huge revelation or easy conclusion – it is merely a moving snapshot of a young man’s life and the trials and tribulations that a strict religious upbringing and a gay conversion program can have on a young adult’s sense of identity. It has an excellent soundtrack that blends perfectly with the narrative and draws you into both the story and Jared’s life as you watch. Although Boy Erased won’t let you walk away feeling uplifted and hopeful, it does give you a better understanding of gay conversion programs, the young people that are sent to them, and most importantly why they need to stop.
Score: 3.5/5