Neil Armfield directed film Holding the Man is a beautiful love story

REVIEW: This compelling true story of two Melbourne schoolboys who fall in love powerfully connects with the collective heart of an audience. Beautiful.

HOLDING THE MAN (MA15+)

Director: Neil Armfield (Candy)

Starring: Ryan Corr, Craig Stott, Anthony LaPaglia, Guy Pearce, Kerry Fox, Sarah Snook.

Rating: ****

Real life makes its tackles, but a true love breaks free

Australian films do a lot of things well, but the telling of a love story with real warmth, intimacy and emotion has always seemed beyond the scope of many of our filmmakers.

The new romantic drama Holding the Man turns that observation on its head with disarming ease.

This compelling true story of two Melbourne schoolboys who fall in love despite their Catholic upbringing and the intense misgivings of their parents powerfully connects with the collective heart of an audience.

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Tim Conigrave (Ryan Corr — front) fell in love with John Caleo (Craig Stott — back) when teens at a Melbourne Catholic school.

RYAN CARR ON GAY SEX AND HOMOPHOBIA

The crowd that I caught Holding the Man with recently just could not hold back their feelings — both happy and sad — in a way I have rarely experienced when it comes to a local production.

The film is adapted from Timothy Conigrave’s best-selling memoir of the same, which was published the year after its author’s death.

A successful later transition to the stage — where it played to great success around the globe — has obviously laid a solid foundation for what transpires on screen.

Events kick off in the mid-1970s, where a dutiful high-school drama student named Tim (a wonderful performance from Ryan Corr) is harbouring a massive crush on his football-star classmate John (played by Craig Stott).

Ryan Corr and Craig Stott play the characters of Tim and John from teenage years to adult life in Holding The Man.

After an awkward start, a mutual attraction takes hold when John wakes up in hospital after suffering a concussion in a brutal on-field collision.

Tim pays the patient a friendly visit, and something clicks between the pair that may not have been there before.

As a close relationship blooms between Tim and John, the intense pressure of keeping their star-crossed bond a secret is kept at bay by both a shared sense of humour (the first half of the film is often very funny) and an unshakable belief in each other.

Later, as the storytelling chronology skips back and forth across time, this loving link is tested to the utmost. Not only when Tim and John are both diagnosed HIV-positive at the outset of the AIDS crisis in the 1980s, but also as their respective families respond (or fail to respond) to their plight.

Guy Pearce and Kerry Fox as Tim’s parents in a scene from Holding the Man. Picture: Transmission Films

Beautifully written, directed and acted, Holding the Man covers an immense area of demanding terrain across its running time.

Though fated by the tragic nature of its story to put all viewers through an emotional wringer, the film earns the right to do so by speaking a personal, yet universal truth that anyone with a heart will immediately understand.

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Originally published as Neil Armfield directed film Holding the Man is a beautiful love story