Henry Gamble and Me

I don't think I've been floored on such a personal level as much as I have just been by Henry Gamble's Birthday Party. I wouldn't necessarily it's a great film, though it is impeccably crafted and marvelous in every way, only messy because it needs to be, but that pales in the face of how devastating, how close it is to my life. I am not white, I am not a pastor's son, my family was never OVERLY religious, I wasn't really in youth groups until this year in college, but it feels so real and true to my life. It is in the spirit, if not the letter, of the way I grew up, the way my mind was framed and how my self is struggling with my past. There is probably something of me in every one of these characters; my pain, my loneliness, my love, my annoyance, my confusion, my joy, and their reserve is just as important as their expression. I see these people around me and in me, and it almost makes me weep to see them hurt or to experience such liberation. A single tear, a single misguided statement, forces me to reconsider who these people are and as a result who I am. Questioning, Christian, a person who receives both Gregg Araki's Kaboom and a Christian book; I know which I'd rather take, blind as I am. I can't put into words how profoundly this affected me.