REVIEW: ‘Boy Erased’ explores fallacy of conversion therapy

During a screening of “Boy Erased” Wednesday night, laughter occasionally filled the ornate Ray Stark Family Theatre.

Yet “Boy Erased” is not a comedy.

In fact, a story about a young boy’s journey through conversion therapy, it’s rightfully and painfully somber. The film, based on the eponymous memoir by Garrard Conley, takes place in early 2000s Arkansas, a region dominated by Christian fundamentalism. The prospect of homosexuality brings legitimate indignation from community members and prompts abhorrent solutions.

But, being screened on a college campus in California in 2018, the mere idea of the events depicted is so inconceivable, so backwards and contemptible, that one can’t help but nervously laugh in disbelief. From testing the boys’ handshakes to mandating a chaperone for bathroom visits, the bizarre conversion techniques depicted stun unfamiliar viewers, making the film both educational and enthralling.

“Boy Erased” begins as Jared Eamons (Lucas Hedges) checks in with his mother (Nicole Kidman) to Love in Action, a gay conversion therapy center run by Victor Sykes (Joel Edgerton), a former “convert.” The film interlaces Jared’s present-day experiences with flashbacks of him discovering his sexuality and coming out to his preacher father (Russell Crowe).

While the atrocities of conversion therapy have been known for some time, “Boy Erased” shines an intimate light on the practice, highlighting the zeal with which community members and pastors persecute LGBTQ youth. Yet, the program participants’ own internalizations of the community’s hatred are most appalling. For instance, Jared says he sometimes imagines he’s Job from the Bible, and that God and the devil are betting over who will get his soul.

The film also demonstrates the small community’s blatant misunderstanding of queerness. After sending Jared to conversion therapy, his father calls a doctor to test Jared’s blood for low levels of testosterone. The doctor tells Jared that while she’s a devout Christian, she also went to medical school and is sure that he’s a perfectly healthy young man.

“Boy Erased” also exposes the sheer absurdity of the quasi-scientific tactics used in conversion therapy. For instance, while a genogram, a family tree listing psychological factors and life events, can be a legitimate tool in sociology and social work, the conversion center perverts the idea. Participants must instead track behavioral sins in their family history to deduce why they are gay. Without a concrete history of behavioral sins in his family, Jared decides he must lie and pretends his uncle was an alcoholic.

Fresh off supporting roles in “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” and “Lady Bird,” Hedges masterfully conveys a desperate fear and sense of self-loathing as Jared during conversion therapy. In flashbacks that punctuate the film, Hedges displays an amalgamation of self-discovery and anxiety without overtly communicating his character’s thoughts and affections.

Throughout, subtleties in Hedges’ performance demonstrate Jared’s internal processing of his situation. With each character Jared meets, his frustration builds, occasionally released in brief fits of resentment.

One particularly arresting moment comes when Jared goes on a nighttime run to clear his mind. He stumbles upon a sexualized men’s cologne advertisement. Jared first looks at the ad with indignation, as if he could never escape his “sinful” thoughts; then, for a moment, he places his hand longingly over the man’s face. Following this brief moment of vulnerability, Jared hurls a rock at the ad, screaming expletives into the man’s shattered face and into the heavens.

Kidman’s performance as Nancy, Jared’s mother, reveals the difficult mental state of a woman who wants to support her son as well as her orthodox husband. This contradiction comes to a head when her husband brings another preacher home to help pray her son’s homosexuality away.

During this scene, Nancy sits, looking ashamed and helpless, while Pastor Wilkins (Frank Hoyt Taylor) holds Jared’s hand and says, “We pray, God, that you make him pure.”

Director Joel Edgerton contributes a harrowing performance as the despicable Victor Sykes, who torments the boys in the conversion program but still maintains the facade that he’s trying to help them. Edgerton understands the loathsome nature of Sykes and the control he imposes over the young boys’ lives. After seeing some of Jared’s books from college — such as “Lolita” and “The Picture of Dorian Gray” — Sykes tells Jared in a private meeting that spending a year at the conversion program might be a better choice than going to college.

While “Boy Erased” focuses on a real, intimate story, the film becomes a conduit for learning about the thousands of young people still subjected to such programs every year. The other program attendees in the film include: a boy determined to just fake it until he can run away (Troye Sivan), a girl forced into conversion therapy housing (Jesse LaTourette), a boy repeating the therapy when it didn’t take the first time (Xavier Dolan) and a boy who commits suicide after being publicly chastised (Britton Sear).

For every wildly misinformed, laughter-inducing scene, an equally abhorrent scene follows, demonstrating the real-life consequences of the often-unbelievable therapy. The end credits for the film state that over 700,000 Americans have undergone such programs. “Boy Erased” provides a passionate and humanizing look at Jared Eamon’s story, but it’s still just one of many — and that’s nothing to laugh at.