everything you have heard about this movie is true.
... View MoreThere's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.
... View MoreIt's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...
... View MoreIt's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.
... View MoreThis wasn't really a big story here, at least I don't remember anything at the time, but in the US, JT LeRoy was a celebrated underground author. Only problem was, he's not real. For a pretty punk tale, this doc is extremely well crafted, lovingly drip feeding the viewer this somewhat tragic and almost poetic and fascinatingly complex story. An intense story of identity, "built brick by dysfunctional brick" with the levels that are reached becoming truly staggering. What is 'real' anyway.
... View MoreA beautiful tale of art-imitating-life-imitating-art. It revved me up to write, and inspired me to kick out the internal blockades. I felt an extremely strong connection to Laura and J.T. I will unabashedly state that I was jealous of the wonderful ride they had - both the highs and the lows. (I have had the lows myself, but never thought to exorcise my demons in the same manner - now I wish I had.) There are points in the film where my heart ached for Laura and J.T., not the least being that I KNOW that both their stories are real in the everyday world around us. In most cases these stories make the news for a minute, and are then submerged under the weight of fresh horrors, or simply because it is easier to ignore these truths than look at them squarely. Laura brought this story to the world in a manner that hooked us and refused to let go. And the story is as beautifully moving as it is dark. For me, although J.T. Is a fiction, I believe the way in which J.T.'s story was given to us is a blessing and not something to be cursed. I see both J.T.'s and Laura's worlds, both real and imagined, and the blurring of the line between the two as a magical place that we can be grateful to be invited into. Bravo Laura, Bravo J.T.!!!!!!
... View MoreThe subject of the film was very interesting but I became increasingly annoyed by the directors showing off. "I felt I was underwater' cut to footage shot underwater. 'I felt I was in a movie', cut to footage imitating a b movie, the director felt the need to underline everything as if the viewer could not imagine for themselves. Words were repeatedly scrawled over the image accompanied by an effect, OK for a while but it repeatedly became a stylistic tic. Tiresome. A shame because the subject was fascinating, It would have been better if the animations were in ironic counterpoint not simply illustrative. There were also many, many shots of telephones.
... View MoreI saw this in my 2nd Yr as a Volunteer at the True/False Film Festival. Sometimes we get lucky to watch movies either thru the Q or as an usher, watching from the wings or empty seats. I knew J.T. Leroy as an author - I read "his" books working as a bookseller in both university and retail. I hadn't heard the name in several years & was lucky to see this doc at the 2016 Festival. I was shocked and amazed - and happy to learn "the fluid truth" this writer. I didn't feel tricked or lied to at all. In fact, for me, the extreme abuse she endured and her choice to create a story in-real-life as a boy makes sense. I see it as the ultimate form of a "pen name," doing so not only to tell a story but also as potentially therapeutic. The documentary shows the aftermath when readers learn her true identity & the over-reaction by readers and publishers. It documents the legal nightmare and (over?) reaction of readers to a quasi-fiction writer when the story should count more than the identity of the author. I agree with those upset that there was a physical lie - she passed someone else off as her in public. Not a great idea, but kids do stupid things. And the stories help those who are subjected to physical, psychological and other forms of abuse as kids/adults because of who we are. For me, the ends justified the deception - the documentary shows that most people in her world don't agree.
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