A gripping if rather implausible story about a group of gay-bashing youths, this sustains interest until the ridiculous ending, when the director gathers up all the plot threads and, instead of weaving them together, ties them into a hopeless snarl. Not only does the last-minute plot revelation make no sense, it "explains" the characters in a very facile, film-school manner, when what makes the film frightening is the fact that we really CAN'T tell what motivates the young characters, and neither can they. They succumb to their worst violent/sexual urges without a second thought, because stopping to think would make their lives completely unbearable. This ending forces "meaning" on us in the way that second-rate well-made plays in the nineteenth century used to.
I'm growing very tired of gay movies that feature their young heroes being raped and/or killed by straight oppressors (who rape them to prove they themselves aren't gay?) It's a cheap way for an artistically impoverished movie to be considered "daring" and "honest", when it really reveals very little. I've always been suspicious of the argument that gay-bashers are all closeted homosexuals striking out at what they fear in themselves (this view also weakened the ending of the otherwise excellent "Milk.")
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