White Frog (2012)

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

I saw this on Netflix, which offered only the very briefest of descriptions, so I had no idea what to expect. But since Netflix had it listed in the LGBT category, I did at least expect a gay-ish theme. But the repeated and somewhat heavy-handed references early in the film to evangelical Christianity (citing of Biblical verses, the prayer at the funeral, the lyrics of the overtly evangelical hymn in the sound track) left me very confused. I am left with the impression of a screenwriter who is gay but also a devout evangelical Christian, a juxtaposition that I personally find troubling. Still, I tried to give the film some benefit of doubt. I was not successful. The writing was uneven and at times very unrealistic, especially in the way Nick's social abilities ... as a person with Asperger's ... vacillated across a wide range. It was as though he suddenly stopped having Asperger's when the writer/director needed him to be able to emote "normally."And the characters seemed too contrived. Wealthy family with domineering and controlling father, submissive pill-popping mother, "perfect" elder son, challenged younger son. It was all too transparent. But the composition of the boys' poker group! One wealthy white with a prestige car, one probable Latino with a mother who worked as a maid, one black guy who looked like he was channeling Pharrell, and one South Asian. It was like a little United Nations! And it seemed totally artificial. The acting was not great, either. I love both BD Wong and Joan Chen, but neither performance impressed me. But this may be due to the limitations of the material with which they had to work. The boys (Poker Group plus Nick) were very unevenly matched, from Justin Martin's downright bad acting to Gregg Sulkin's roller-coaster of scene-by-scene good-to-bad-to-good-again. Call me crazy, but this entire film might have worked better if a) the overt references to evangelical Christianity were removed and b) the setting were shifted from the wealthy suburbs of LA to a working class neighborhood in middle America.

"White Frog" really surprised me as I watched it. Why? Well, because the movie had a fairly nice story, but what really impressed me was the acting in the movie.The story is about a young boy named Nick, who has Asperger's syndrome, whose older brother dies in a tragic accident. Not fitting into the world around him, Nick struggles to get closer to the world that his older brother lived in.There are some really nice moments to the movie, which were nicely portrayed and executed on the screen. But the great performances from the actors and actresses really helped bring this movie to life.I can't really claim to be familiar with the acting talent of Booboo Stewart, but he really carried this movie so nicely. But it wasn't him alone, everyone in the movie were doing great jobs. And it was also particularly nice to see Joan Chen in a movie such as this.If you enjoy drama movies that are carried by a proper and solid story, then you definitely should check out "White Frog". And this movie easily earns a 7 out of 10 stars rating from me, no doubt about it.

There are not many movies, which can tell a story with little to no major effects. It is about being human and being alive and acceptance. Something which I feel is almost lost in our world today.Allowing oneself and others to be different. I feel, this movie shows exactly where our society is heading - hiding behind a veil of lies. Pretending to be perfect, where perfection never can be met anyway.Important for me mostly is, that it shows, that Aspergers or any form of being different, is mostly a label by society and then those affected, are pushed to live in a certain way - an invisible prison.What a great piece of art. And this is how I see my world today

Undoubted this is the best gay movie I've ever seen in my life and believe me I've watched quite a few of them over the last 52 Years.What's making this movie special is not only the acting of the young man playing the role of a disabled younger brother; all other actors as well are doing a wonderful job in portraying their characters.No matter what race, religion or believe it meets everyone's difficulty in showing who and what you really are. We're just human and that's all there is to it, not more and not less.We're all week inside of us, but at the same time we can all be strong if we strive for it and finally find the courage to be it.Allow me to make a final remark. I've never written a review, but decided to do it due to the fact that I was so impressed!