C.R.A.Z.Y. 4 U

Recently the French-Canadian film C.R.A.Z.Y. swept the Genies, Canada's equivalent to the Academy Awards. I'm not sure when it's coming out in the States, but do see it if you get a chance. I reviewed it during the Portland International Film Festival in February:

C.R.A.Z.Y.
Grade: A-

At first glance C.R.A.Z.Y. is a fairly straightforward drama about a Quebec family, but writer and director Jean-Marc Vallée combines vivid fantasy sequences, dynamic camera work and flashy editing to elevate the material from a soap opera to a visceral cinematic experience.
The film opens with the birth of the main character, Zac, on Christmas Day in 1960. This establishes a Christ parallel that becomes more obvious (and heavy-handed) when it later turns out that Zac has the power to ease the pain of colicky babies and burn victims.
Zac appears to be a gifted child that any parent would die for, and his mother loves him unconditionally. But when he starts dressing up like a girl, his conventional father fears he has a sissy on his hands. His discomfort with Zac’s incipient fagginess creates a virtually insurmountable rift between father and son.
As a teenager, Zac’s sexual identity crisis sometimes gets overshadowed by his older brother’s losing battle with drug addiction. He eventually seeks asylum from his father in Jerusalem, but a family tragedy unexpectedly plants the seeds of reconciliation between Zac and Pops.
There’s nothing revolutionary about C.R.A.Z.Y. Thankfully, coming out stories are not a rarity. As for Christ figures, they’re as old as, well, Christ - even if this one happens to be a cute gay kid who grooves to "Space Oddity."
Still, there’s no denying that this is bravura filmmaking. And Vallée has an uncanny knack for making all of his characters compelling.
And the soundtrack is just plain awesome. Classics by David Bowie, The Rolling Stones and Jefferson Airplane provide an electrifying backdrop to scenes that span from the 1960s to the 1980s. Patsy Cline’s “Crazy” is the title track.