By Emilio Frenk
Director: Andrew Neel
Cast: Ben Schnetzer, Nick Jonas, Gus Harper, Danny Flaherty, Virginia Gardner, Jack Picking and James Franco.
Rating: Excellent.
Andrew Neel, director of “King Kelly” brings the fraternity drama “Goat”; this is a very hard movie to watch but at the same time it’s very well made.
Based in true events, the movie tells the story of Brandon (Ben Schnetzer), a young teenager that one night after a party is assaulted by two strangers who beat him up and steal his car.
The result of this situation is that his brother Brett (Nick Jonas) is really angry and tries to convince his brother to go to the police about this situation.
Instead of going to the police, Brad decides to enroll in the same University as his brother and eventually tries to pledge to the same fraternity his brother belongs to.
Thinking that his brother will go easy on him, Brad´s loyalty is going to be tested in many brutal ways and this eventually will either make him a part of a fraternity or not.
One of the things that I liked of “Goat” is the performances of the cast, specially Ben Schentzer who played Brad with so much realism that he delivers a memorable performance and I see a vey bright future in him.
The script which is based on the memoir of “Brad Land” and was written by Andrew Neel as well as David Gordon Green, who’s most notable work is movies like “Pineapple Express” and “Joe” was written in so much detail and takes us through the journey of one man who will do anything to be accepted in a group.
The message of the movie of self acceptance is another factor that it was very interested and it is portrayed in an original level that has never seen before and this is one of the main reasons the movie works.
I previoulsy mentionedthe movie has a very hard subject due to the things that had been happening recently and portrays all the things a human being has to do or can do to get accepted.
“Goat” without a doubt is one of the most original movies I´ve seen in a while and I put it as one of the years best.
Please be open and prepared to see this movie due to the hard theme that is managed but I do recommend it at all levels.