Perfect cast and a good story

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

Make The Yuletide Gay is a wonderful film that I would recommend to far more than LGBTQ audiences. It is to be fondly hoped that more and more gay youth experience what the leads Keith Jordan and Adam Ruggiero at Christmas time.Jordan plays an out and proud college student and Ruggiero is his boyfriend. Except for one thing, neither has come out to parents. Their concerns are quite real. In my own life I've met too many gay people who were disowned by families and had some terrible life experiences stemming from that.Jordan is heading home to his Wisconsin family and Ruggiero was going to go home, but his parents Ian Buchanan and Gates McFadden are busy in their social world and have just won a cruise for two. So left on his own devices Ruggiero comes to Jordan's and the two have to figure out where their relationship is going.Jordan's parents are an interesting pair. Derek Long was a Grateful Dead fanatic in his youth, now he seems like someone who's just retreated from life. Kelly Keaton is in her own world and appears totally clueless about all around her.Without going into too much detail let's say it's Merry Christmas to all. For a gay themed movie this thing is practically G-rated. Sad to say that the sight of two attractive young men showing passionate care for each other is still likely to earn a restricted rating. Really there's nothing here,even the youngest audiences could see it and not be 'damaged' for life. But just the subject of same gender sex is enough to get the Puritan in some going.I would recommend this as a model film for PFLAG to show how some parents really do care for their children first no matter what their sexual orientation may be.

A sweet or really fabulous film on coming out; not in the world which is college for the two boys (That was done a long time ago and everyone knows about it), but in their families. On one side Olaf has to reveal his parents he is gay, on the other side Nathan has to reveal his family he has a boy friend. Both are hard, both situations and probably both boys too. One has to be done face to face. The other has to be done on an answering machine that will only be listened to three weeks later.But the film is not only fabulous because of these last five minutes but because all along it is innuendo upon innuendo and it never ends. We believe up to those last five minutes that it is pure innocence if not simple-mindedness on Olaf's parents' side, but it is true there is some humour when people who play straight 100% start telling you that "If you put enough meat in a man's mouth, he is happy". And there is also some humour when the two boys confronted with sharing the same room and bunk beds the one like the other both pretend that they both like to be on top, and the poor mother does not seem to catch the very direct meaning.The best part is not about the film. It is about the quotes from this film given by cinema sites: I have not found one single of these funny remarks that are funny because of their double-entendre. Why on earth are some people shy about it, even when it does not concern them directly? I wonder. That is not modesty at all but guilt somewhere, and probably rejection.The film is probably not going to revolutionize our way of looking at gay people coming out of the famous closet, and it is probably not that simple and easy to do. But it is a funny film that reveals how two men can really love each other just because they love each other and there is no explanation for love. It is just beautiful and hot, indeed, burning hot. "All you need is love!" Quoted in the film.And even if it is true we are always amazed how well most people are able to accept love, no matter what kind of love it is because there are always a few who will become brutal and aggressive just for the fun and the anger of blowing up a gay man.I cannot understand why so many people can only see that love can only be straight, whereas love can be mental, artistic, musical, sentimental, passionate, gay, straight or LGBT. And there is no obligation for that love to be hormonal at all. We can, we must, we should love many people for all types of reason and in all types of way, each form of love reinforcing all other forms. Just loving another person is the most beautiful thing in the world and the phenomenal transformation it operates in one's mind and way of looking at the world is a good enough reason to accept and even worship every and any form of love.And a love affair can always be carried out to its acme between two sheets of paper in a book, or two prints from the 18th century or two blankets of silky thinking on the latest physical discovery about how protons, neutrinos, electrons, and so many other photons can spend their whole life chasing one another and yet never meeting and having any kind of a direct physical encounter.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU

Due to my own not-so-good experiences with my coming-out (thanks, mum and dad!!), I'm a real sucker for feel-good coming-out movies - they never fail to bring me to some heartfelt tears of shared happiness. So with these kind of movies I'm not that critical as to whether the script, the direction or the acting is really above par. That's a good thing with this movie, for it's rather balancing on the verge. Although I enjoyed it and it served it's purpose, there are many flaws.For starters: there seem to have been made some strange and awkward choices in the editing. At many, many points the movie comes to a stand-still, when the camera lingers far too long on the face of a person after he or she has said or done something. When you want to stress some Deap Meaning this can be quite functional, but in a comedy, or at least at moments when comedy is intended, it's killing: it not only effects the pace but it sucks the punch out-off every punch-line! This brings me to my next reservation: there are way too many double entendres in the script, it dangerously tilts the movie to the point of below-the-belt cheapness. Sure, I laughed at some of them (even at the beaver-joke), but it annoyed me too, this movie didn't need all that, since it's a situational comedy the fun should come out of the situation itself and the opposite characters.Another reservation concerns the side-characters (and thus again the script). When you have so few characters in the story (in fact there are only four important ones, apart from the girl next door), and two of them (both parents) are personified and pictured in such an extreme and surreal way, then in my opinion it becomes totally top-heavy and negatively affects the balance of the story. One lunatic parent, with maybe one or two lunatic neighbors would had been quite enough.A last negative remark to the script: although it's a comedy, there ought to be maintained - especially in this kind of situational comedy - some sort of basic feeling of reality. Here this was put to the test way too often. Can a renowned professor walk around for a whole professional career being perpetually stoned out of his wits? Are these parents (obviously from the 60's love-generation) blind as bats, not to see that their son's room-mate Nathan is gayer than gay?! Is the switch of the neighbor-girl from love-sick goody two-shoes to an almost professional foul-mouthing fag-hag not a tiny bit too abrupt and weird?? And is the almost utopian coolness of both parents at the eventual outing of their son not a tiny bit out-of sync with the beforehand constant hammering of at least mama with her son on the theme of girls, marriage, family etc.? Wouldn't such cool and unorthodox parents (who make out with each other almost publicly, have such loud sex that their son has to put a pillow over his head, and with a father who walks around the house with his morning-gown hanging open and in that state even opens the front door when a stranger calls) - wouldn't such cool and care-free parents have already brought up the topic of sex with their only son a long time ago?? Well, anyway, now for the good things. This is without any doubt a very sympathetic, warm and sincere movie. There is, thank god, not so much a Big Message that has to be drilled-in, it just keeps close to the real-life fears of a gay adolescent when being on the brink of revealing his true self to his family: will they accept me in this new light? will I disappoint them? will things change between us? The script doesn't provide a big plot - like in so many other comparable coming-of-age movies - with complicated misunderstandings, plot-shifts and all kinds of side-stories; no, it just sort of strolls along on it's basic theme and in this way gets a nice and quiet development. The comedy-elements are, as said, not of the most subtle kind, but in spite of the serious theme the lighthearted tone of the movie succeeds in making you smile all the time, and that is not a bad thing. The characters of the parents are unrealistic and over-the-top, so it must have been hard for the actors to make something out of it, but I have to give credit to Kelly Keaton who gives, within the limits and pitfalls of the script, a very good, enthusiastic and affectionate performance. The main characters are of course Olav and Nathan, both are given a fine and convincing portrayal by Keith Jordan resp. Adamo Ruggiero. I didn't know Ruggiero, I never saw "Degrassi", he's certainly beautiful and very cute and I thought that he grew in his role; he was supposed to be the gayish extrovert of the two boyfriends, but he proved that within that stereotype he could actually find his own nuances - for instance when father Gunnunderson finds him all alone on a sidewalk terrace, Ruggiero really succeeds in moving you. But I especially liked Keith Jordan, he had this subdued, under-cooled (as we say in Holland) way of acting that only enhanced the feeling of reality, and he is so cute and endearing in his seriousness, that it made me want to put his head on my shoulder and tell him that eventually everything would be okay!All in all the good things far outweighed the bad, and I vote it a heartfelt 8 out of 10!

Make the Yuletide Gay is not a great piece of art. This is not a film that will open on a ton of screens worldwide and earn millions of box office dollars. This is a small budget gay themed holiday film. If you go into it expecting anything more than a bunch of corny jokes and a formulaic plot, you'll be disappointed. College student Gustav "Gun" Gunderson (Keith Jordan) is out and proud at school but is secretly not out to his eccentric Midwestern parents (Derek Long and Kelly Keaton). During the Christmas holidays he struggles to find the right time to finally tell his parents the truth. When his boyfriend Nathan's holiday plans fall through, Nathan (Adamo Ruggiero) surprises Gustav by showing up on the Gunderson home to spend the holidays. Comedy ensues.This film explores familiar territory but it's a fun ride. Some of the jokes you see coming, but generally the script is quite clever. There are a few awkward transitions and the editing could have been a lot tighter. The camera particularly overplays Keaton as mom Anya Gunderson, lingering on her a few moments too long after each punch line. Often removing a few beats here and there would have made a lot of difference.Keith Jordan does a fantastic job. Despite the fact this is a comedy and everything will probably turn out for the best, Jordan manages to make the "what if" fears seem real. Degrassi-The Next Generation's Adamo Ruggiero seemed oddly uncomfortable in front of the camera during the early scenes. Initially I had trouble believing he and costar Jordan were in a long-term relationship. Ruggiero's acting steadily improves as the film progresses and eventually delivers a good performance, but he was obviously chosen to draw in an audience.Make the Yuletide Gay is fun and light-hearted with a few good laughs. It won't become a mandatory Holiday viewing, but it is perfect for what it is. In other words, you get what you pay for.