Rock Haven is the story of a devout christian teenager struggling to come to terms with his budding homosexuality while falling in love with his hot neighbor. The movie is written and directed by David Lewis. It was his first feature film directing job and he did pretty well.
Normally, I am a sucker for this kind of movie but for some reason Rock Haven just didn't click with me. The movie is adequately directed with some absolutely beautiful shots but some of the dialogue and scenes just did not feel natural. They seemed almost rushed and shoe-horned in to get a point across.
The cast for the most part is good. There are some scenes where the acting is slightly painful but for the most part they do well. The two leads Sean Hoagland and Owen Alabado have a great chemistry together and both did well for the most part. I can see Sean establishing himself a nice long career in the industry.
The rest of the cast was decent. It seemed as if it was a first time acting gig for a lot of them. I didn't really buy Katheryn Hecht as Clifford's (Owen Alabado) mom though. They just didn't fit together well.
The ending if I am not mistaken is supposed to be a kind of twist I guess but it's so utterly obvious that it has no value on the movie at all.
One thing that Rock Haven did that I appreciate is its take on Christianity. It didn't present religion as a bad thing or an enemy like many other movies of this type. Instead, it showed Brady (Sean Hoagland) struggling to accept himself within the confines of his beliefs. It is a hard battle and is presented fairly well, albeit briefly.
There isn't any real confrontation in the movie. When Brady tells his mother his secret, he doesn't even really say it. He just sort of lets her finish his thought, she doesn't really react. She just sits there and then suddenly he is going to some camp to get ungayed.
I won't spoil the ending for you. I'll only say that it was an inspired choice and things don't quite turn out as you might expect them too.
Overall, the movie is watchable. There is a lot of scenery shots and silent introspection which seemed like a way to pad the movie to lengthen it. Granted the shots of the scenery are beautiful but there were a lot of them. Lots of scenes of waves and rocks and people walking around them thinking deeply. It's almost detrimental to the movie. It almost seemed like it was paced this way.
They probably should have left in some of the deleted scenes. One of the characters comes off as a lesbian even though she isn't and there is a character named Dug (Johnny Yono, who incidentally went to high school with me) who shows up briefly with absolutely no explanation as to who he is or where he came from. Turns out he is the boyfriend of the aforementioned suspected lesbian. I went through the entire movie thinking this and was only corrected when I watched the deleted scenes.
Long review short (too late) it's a decent first stab. Granted, it doesn't bring anything new to the table it does have brief moments of heart that make up for the less than stellar moments.
Rock Haven will be released on DVD November 6 from TLA Releasing.
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