Smalltown Boys (Review) – a fascinating but, at times, fragmented exploration of community and belonging

Smalltown Boys (Des garçons de province) is available on Prime Video, Peccadillo On Demand and Vimeo On Demand.

For all LGBTQ+ people, where you grow up or the place you call home significantly impacts your lived experience. For those living in small towns or rural villages, a sense of isolation often leads to a life of closed opportunities to meet other LGBTQ+ people and find love and companionship. Hence many choose to escape their small home town as soon as possible and head for the nearest city, where they can build a sense of community surrounded by people who understand their needs, wants and desires. But some don’t make this move due to family pressures, careers or fear of stepping outside their comfort zone, and for them, small-town life offers a double-edged sword of comfort, security and, often, loneliness. Gaël Lépingle’s Smalltown Boys (Des garçons de province) explores these themes through three interconnecting stories set in three provincial French towns.

In a small restaurant and bar, he runs with his partner, Youcef dreams of escape. Youcef (Yves Batek Mendy) met his partner at a young age and now finds himself running a rural bar that doesn’t feel like home. But it’s not until drag artist and performer Jonas (Léo Pochat) arrives for a gig with his troupe of vaudeville performers that this sense of isolation spills over as he questions his place, love and commitment. Meanwhile, in another town, a teenage boy wanders the streets in stilettos as he defiantly stamps his difference on a sleepy village with little to no opportunities for him to flourish, waiting for his ticket to escape; university. While not far away, a middle-aged teacher and photographer leads a double life taking photos of young men he lures into his hidden, lonely and closeted world, where his unhappiness is born from a need to hide from his students and community.

Lépingle’s film raises several meaningful discussions about our shared LGBTQ+ community experience in early and later life. I have lost track of the number of straight people I have talked to who don’t understand our need for community and security in our choice of home. Statements such as “Well, there is one gay couple that lives in the village, so you could get to know them.” Or “There’s a gay pub an hour away, so you could always go there.” The truth is straight people never face the prospect of living somewhere where they are the only heterosexual in the village. If they did, they might understand the dilemma all LGBTQ+ people face when choosing a safe, secure, happy home.

Despite superb performances and assured direction, Lépingle’s three stories never quite come together in the final act. Here Smalltown Boys struggles to fully explore some of the discussions it raises on those who stay, return to or forever escape the town or village of their birth. But despite this flaw, Lépingle’s film remains fascinating as he explores the void between endings and new beginnings and the turmoil that engulfs us as we choose whether to run into the unknown or stay in the safety of our present, even if that leads to unhappiness. We have all experienced this turmoil at some point in our life, but for LGBTQ+ people, the stakes are often higher as we face the ultimate choice; be free and be you or be what your community tells you to be.