In continuing with the celebration of Hispanic heritage month, let\u2019s take a look at a film about love, care,\u00a0 and self-acceptance. Released in November of 2018 and directed by Mart\u00edn Deus, Mi Mejor Amigo (or My Best Friend in English) is an LGBT coming-of-age story set in Argentina. The film follows Lorenzo, Angelo Mutti Spinetta,\u00a0 and his family as they welcome Ca\u00edto, Lautaro Rodriguez, the son of a friend of Lorenzo\u2019s Father, into their lives. The film shows us the journey that Lorenzo and Ca\u00edto take together, one of caring, exploration, and loneliness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the beginning of the film, viewers quickly meet both of the protagonists. Lorenzo is a bookworm who is confronted with a struggle between what he likes and what he thinks he is supposed to like. This is seen through various scenes in the film. The first time we see the extent of his dissonance is when Lorenzo is in the locker room at school feeling discomfort with the boys around him, and is next seen after spending intimate moments with a friend, who is a girl, after which he walks away looks disappointed and wipes his lips. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Lorenzo represents this common sequence of discovery found in the stories of many gay people. This is the confrontation between the norm and being different, experimentation, and discovery. He becomes further confronted by his attraction and feelings when Ca\u00edto moves in.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ca\u00edto\u2019s journey is tumultuous, to say the least. While initially under the impression that he was here while his dad was recovering from an accident Lorenzo is surprised by the true circumstances behind Ca\u00edto\u2019s stay. According to Ca\u00edto, he was required to pay rent for the room he was sharing with his stepbrother, a kickboxer. He tells Lorenzo that his stepbrother beat him up and he admits that in retaliation he beat him up with an iron rod. Lorenzo is shocked to hear this and Ca\u00edto tells Lorenzo that he told him to be honest. While he is surprised by this at first Lorenzo recognizes the beginning of doubt in Ca\u00edto’s voice and reassures him that he appreciates his honesty. Lorenzo promises to keep his secret.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lorenzo\u2019s <\/strong>loneliness is what drives his actions and seems to be what the film is about. This can be seen at first with his experimentation with girls, his interactions with friends of both genders, and his first interactions with Ca\u00edto. He goes on to tell Ca\u00edto about his feelings only to be called a pejorative. Throughout the film, we see this sort of inching closer together between the two. Lorenzo attempts to take care of Ca\u00edto, while Lorenzo\u2019s loneliness is quelled. It quickly develops into more than that however. The pair become a mutually beneficial relationship that transforms into a friendship and then something more. Lorenzo helps Ca\u00edto stay consistent with his job, they celebrate Ca\u00edto\u2019s birthday together, and go camping together. The last of these activities is where we see all of these interactions build up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ca\u00edto and Lorenzo fight during their time on the camping trip. Eventually they forgive each other and decide to stay another night on the camping trip, this leads the boys to smoke and for Lorenzo to be more open, he tells Ca\u00edto to close his eyes. He does and Lorenzo kisses him on the cheek to which Ca\u00edto tells his new friend that he loves him. Lorenzo himself closes his eyes and Ca\u00edto looks at him. Eventually, we find out that the stepbrother dies and Ca\u00edto feels the urge to run away leaving Lorenzo devastated. Ca\u00edto leaves Lorenzo with a hug and the latter spends the last moments of the film lost and alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mi Mejor Amigo<\/em> is about two individuals who became very close in a short span of time. Lorenzo and Ca\u00edto go from being awkward around each other, to a caring relationship (especially for Lorenzo), to a friendship, to something more than that. However to Lorenzo\u2019s dismay and due to the circumstances of Ca\u00edto\u2019s situation they can\u2019t explore that.\u00a0 These circumstances devastate Lorenzo and again, like many parallels with real gay people, leave him alone. What Lorenzo gained from the journey was a clearer understanding of what he was and where his accepting parents stood, but what he lost was someone he could call his best friend at the very least.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mi Mejor Amigo<\/em> was a film that greatly parallels the experiences of certain LGBT people and their journey of self-acceptance. It does this in the context of a Latino family which is not often seen in the media. It offers a portrayal of what a person will do to ease loneliness and how that humble intent can lead to more intense feelings and devastating disappointment. It was a truly beautiful and intimate journey. It presents a conundrum people deal with all the time, falling for your best friend and what it\u2019s like to lose them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I give Mi Mejor Amigo an 8\/10 for its intimate portrayal of an LGBT protagonist, its beautiful shots, and the potential in its actors<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" BY JOHN CARTER JR This review is based on the Amazon Prime translation of the film In continuing with the celebration of Hispanic heritage month,… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":142,"featured_media":67849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3391,55],"tags":[12573,14799,14181],"class_list":["post-67848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie-reviews","category-opinion","tag-john-carter-jr-2","tag-mi-mejor-amigo","tag-retro-review"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/tigermedianet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/My-best-friend-1.png?fit=512%2C288&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/142"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=67848"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67848\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":67854,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67848\/revisions\/67854"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/67849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=67848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=67848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=67848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/tigermedianet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/My-best-friend-2.png?resize=512%2C266\")
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