Were the World Mine (2008)

Overrated

It is not deep, but it is fun to watch. It does have a bit more of an edge to it than other similar films.

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.

Our hero recreates the love potion from Midsummer Night's Dream. By amazing co-incidence, the first person each of his victim's sees after having the potion squirted in his eyes is of the same sex and age, and they fall passionately in love.These newly created gays do not behave like ordinary gays. They have no fear of being open about their sexuality. The cannot understand when their love is not reciprocated. They are as persistent as horny dogs. They don't give up and try someone else. They are also manic blissed out of their minds.The movie improperly conflates being gay with being a drag queen, plastering on makeup like Adam Lambert, and prancing about doing ballet steps like Ulyana Lopatkina. Nobody actually has sex, though they do kiss.The action takes place in an all-boys school. The actors are all hunky, good dancers, good athletes and good singers. There is quite a bit of music and singing. I wish there were even more. It is haunting and beautiful.It has a bitter-sweet ending as everyone returns to normal, with a heart- warming twist.Every young gay male flipped for some resolutely heterosexual male and had to watch from a distance as the girls pawed over him, feeling totally left out. This movie is the fantasy cure. Warning: much of the movie does not make any sense.

This is a film for the young at heart be you gay or straight or just curious. And did you see that Peter Ustinov 1948 film "Visa Versa"? If you like modern day fairy tales, musicals and films set in boys boarding schools then enter Shakespeare's Dream for a boy who is different.After watching it you too may also wonder if this is exactly the sort of film that could be useful to schools since it reverses the idea of what is "normal" when it comes to sexuality.I particularly enjoyed the way the story unfolds. Very clever. Now you see me now you don't. Like magic!"All the world's a stage" says the fabulous Wendy Robie between watering her naughty weedy seedlings(no cctv) and standing up to the schools silly head. She's great! If there were more Ms Tebbit's around the world would be a far more enchanting and tolerant place to live. And at the end of the film when she says "Well now that you've had your fun" our dear lovely Puck finds his spell's true implication. We are left after the curtain goes down resounding like tuning forks! So please watch this film if you haven't already done so and if you have maybe watch it again ... I'm going to.

Were the World Mine may not be perfect, but it is inspiring, with a brilliant and durable concept (a queer interpretation and extension of A Midsummer Night's Dream). Like a previous reviewer, I just saw this at the San Francisco Int'l LGBT Film Festival, where it was indeed a solid crowd pleaser and one of my three favorite features in the festival. The film grew from the director's short film "Fairies" (which was also memorable) and I dare say that the music and lyrics, and certainly the lead performers, deserve to have him tighten it up a bit, somehow get lots more money, and carry this forward to a remake a la Baz Luhrmann ("Moulin Rouge") or Julie Taymor ("Across the Universe"). In a way, the material is both weighty and fanciful enough to really need that level of realization to be properly appreciated. As is, though, "Were the World Mine" moved me to tears, made me laugh many times, and made me want to listen to its few songs again, more closely!

Timothy (Tanner Cohen) is a rugby player in school and openly gay. The other guys treat him like dirt. Then he's cast as Puck in the school's production of "A Midsummer's Night Dream". He finds a flower that makes the person he squirts it at fall in love magically with the first person they see. He starts off by making the whole rugby team AND the coach fall in love with other men...but things quickly get out of hand. Oh yes--and there are musical numbers! Now I DO applaud what this film is doing--updating (kind of) Shakespeare's play but I didn't like it. For starters Cohen isn't exactly a good actor. He seems too nervous--but he sings beautifully. The humor here also seems too forced--I think I smiled once. The plot also derails more than once and things stop making sense. However, seeing young men openly kissing and making out was hot and very romantic, the musical numbers were great and (Cohen aside) the acting was perfect. Still I was bored and annoyed more than once. It's message is great (accept people for who they are) but the execution is clumsy. I can only give this a 6.