I'm fairly certain that any gay teacher has a well developed sense of self-preservation as well as a heightened, possibly exaggerated, awareness of the perceptions others have of him as he interacts with people, especially young males, around him. The somewhat annoying Michael seems to be clueless in this regard. His excessive interest in a special scholarship student, whose step-father works as a janitor in the school, and his touching & pawing of this student, borders on the ridiculous. And, aside from raising red flags amongst parents & fellow teachers, any sensible teacher would realize his constant attention to an individual student would only further alienate this "special" student from his peers.
This all appears to come to a head when Michael is putting his hands all over Jason in the school hallway and Jason pushes him away telling him quite loudly to keep his hands off and calling him a faggot with a carefully staged audience of staff, parents and students standing about in stunned silence.
Of course, in this fairy tale everyone in the small town (a sort of green Camelot) had been just peachy keen enthusiastic about Michael and his gay lover moving there from NY, one becoming a teacher, the other opening a business. But as soon as Jason makes it clear he doesn't like all the touchy-feely hands-on concern from Michael, the brown stuff hits the fan and things are no longer idyllic green.
To burnish this mediocre soap opera's credentials, we've got someone with cancer, we've got a lecherous step-father (in the lowly profession of janitor, wandering about unshaven to make sure we know he's a bad guy), we've got everyone from a roofing contractor to the town's busybody cancelling contracts with Michael and partner as well as shunning them in public. And it turns out our supposed victim-stroke-hero has a prior arrest for indecent exposure. One isn't quite sure if the whole thing wasn't actually intended to lampoon more credible and well-scripted stories about damaging accusations and their painful consequences.
Not to fear. The bad guy gets shot and all is well in the credulity- stretching, hackneyed, rushed conclusion to a cliché-ridden movie populated by all the popular PC stereotypical characters.
And, like Pavlov's dogs responding to the bells, all the soap opera loving politically correct reviewers gush and gasp. A reasonably serious subject treated like a cartoon. Sad, superficial and trite.
This all appears to come to a head when Michael is putting his hands all over Jason in the school hallway and Jason pushes him away telling him quite loudly to keep his hands off and calling him a faggot with a carefully staged audience of staff, parents and students standing about in stunned silence.
Of course, in this fairy tale everyone in the small town (a sort of green Camelot) had been just peachy keen enthusiastic about Michael and his gay lover moving there from NY, one becoming a teacher, the other opening a business. But as soon as Jason makes it clear he doesn't like all the touchy-feely hands-on concern from Michael, the brown stuff hits the fan and things are no longer idyllic green.
To burnish this mediocre soap opera's credentials, we've got someone with cancer, we've got a lecherous step-father (in the lowly profession of janitor, wandering about unshaven to make sure we know he's a bad guy), we've got everyone from a roofing contractor to the town's busybody cancelling contracts with Michael and partner as well as shunning them in public. And it turns out our supposed victim-stroke-hero has a prior arrest for indecent exposure. One isn't quite sure if the whole thing wasn't actually intended to lampoon more credible and well-scripted stories about damaging accusations and their painful consequences.
Not to fear. The bad guy gets shot and all is well in the credulity- stretching, hackneyed, rushed conclusion to a cliché-ridden movie populated by all the popular PC stereotypical characters.
And, like Pavlov's dogs responding to the bells, all the soap opera loving politically correct reviewers gush and gasp. A reasonably serious subject treated like a cartoon. Sad, superficial and trite.