Ben DeBacker, the non-binary character from Tommy Dorfman’s first film ‘I Wish You All the Best’ played by Corey Fogelmanis, decides to tell his parents about his gender identity but his decision does not yield good results.
The viewer is presented with an impressionistic style to add tension to the mournful scene. The camera focuses on Ben, who is looking at an index card; they are persistent in their movements towards the kitchen. Before we realize it, Ben makes an attempt to call up his sister, Hannah. The North Caroline adolescent is seen in a gas station grocery store with no shoes and and holes on their socks. Things come into perspective for the audience when Hannah enters the scene, visibly tense and panting.
The film made its debut at the SXSW, where it was titled I Wish You All the Best follows the protagonist, Ben, as he weaves through the emotional turmoil that comes with coming out of the closet to his parents and the conflict of new surroundings as he moves in with his sister and her husband, Cole Sprouse. Dorfman was among the writers of the film and is also one of the writers behind the book of the same title and the novel instructions that I Wish You All the Best is based on. This film I Wish You All the Best does this with a certain dignity: it explores the lives of nonbinary teenagers without claim excessive focus at most traumatic experiences.
The tone resembles that of Netflix’s Heartstopper and is charming enough to compensate for the more clumsy aspects of its depiction of teenage life, much in the way Josephine Decker’s Love Is Everywhere manages to do.
Now, it isn’t easy for Ben to come to terms with the change of environment that she’s also been subjected to by their parents’ sheltered parenting styles. Without any further ado, Hannah takes them to a new school, gets them some clothes, and along with her husband, helps them find a part-time job. Very soon, their secrets and the awkwardness that surrounded their relationship give way to a heartwarming eagerness to understand each other better.
While Fogelmanis, Daddario and Sprouse all have their different strengths, the emotions of their family bond hardly touch the viewers. This is also linked to the fact that the film does not have a constant pace. Dorfman covers so many bases, that the relationships don’t have enough time to breath on the screen. Consequently, it occasionally gravitates towards the staccato beats and melodrama associated with shows like This Is Us.
It is a relief to see the film move in a different direction with Bens school life, where he and his sister have an unconventional art teacher played by the brilliant Lena Dunham and their first crush Nathan (Miles Gutierrez-Riley). At his previous high school, Ben was a wallflower and tried to disappear, but this is a new town where people actually care about the teenager and so that becomes hard. An outgoing bisexual, Nathan, who matches his nails to his outfits, quickly integrates Ben into his clique. The only thing that could have been better explained is the way Nathan was attracted to Ben, but due to the great chemistry between Fogelmanis and Gutierrez-Riley, it never felt forced. As Nathan and Ben grow closer, Dorfman allows the couple\’s intimacy to develop in a more realistic way, focusing on their needs and how their relationship progresses.
When not fantasizing about Nathan, Ben runs around with Ms.
Lyons. This goes as well for Dunham — she is greatest at this, like the eccentric art teacher naturally fitted to taking the shy, the nervous and the self stamped as freaks to self-acceptance. The Sharp Stick director pulls off almost all the scenes she is in by using her trademark nervous-abjection-in-confessional-comedy. She also incorporates warmth into the character, an administrator who sees Ben’s gender confusion without looking down on the boy.
With Ms. Lyons’ ethos, Dorfman permeates I Wish You All the Best. The film is honest a little too much and although it is with a few rough edges, it understands what it is doing. The style in which Dorfman shoots is characterized by emotional close-ups, and only deviates from what a smaller screen plant would expect when depicting Ben’s emotional world. In an effort to acquire texture of this delicate area, Dorfman relies on the teenager’s evolving wardrobe (costume designer is David Tabbert) and in more clear shots emphasizes Ben’s growing ease with inanimate objects. At such times the teenager, who was all squished in the corner of a mini mart, now stands up as if he was on the run-into the arms of freedom.
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