Late Summer (2001)

dir David Ottenhouse

I love a ~30 minute short film. Perfect length for round storytelling. Okay let’s get into it.

Discovered this one via some Charlie Day fans online who were bemoaning the fact that his appearance in Late Summer is too short. Many fans also complained that the story was creepy and inappropriate. In this disgustingly cruel and unfair world, I will always defend art as a place of play and reflection. Stories do not endorse through depiction, they invite you to ponder and process your own possibly complex, maybe even ugly thoughts on the matter. From art, we can safely grow. We can make mental mistakes instead of tangible ones, we can think and rethink and unthink until we feel okay. Weird things on a screen will not jump out and hurt you!

Within the first few minutes we are introduced to Josh’s family, waiting for his younger cousin, Adam, at the train station. We learn that Adam’s father has recently passed away. The boys’ dynamic is innocent enough. Adam is a little reserved, perhaps because of his recent loss, or perhaps because of the boys’ age difference, but Josh quickly includes him in the action. Adam tries smoking weed for the first time, he stumbles upon his cousin having sex with his girlfriend, he plays with the older boys: basketball, wrestling, skateboarding. It’s clear that he has a fondness for his older cousin, but it’s not as overtly incestuous or homosexual as others made it seem. After losing his father, Adam has to find a new role model, specifically someone who can teach him to grow up into the man he’s very eager to become. I don’t know. I think that’s fine. Understandable. Maybe Adam still ends up gay, or maybe he was gay the whole time. My point is that I don’t think it really matters.

At the end, Josh cheers on Adam as he takes photos while skateboarding in the street. Adam watches Josh get hit by a car and die upon impact, right after capturing the coolest shot that you could take of a teenage boy: two peace signs thrown up and not a care in the world. It’s rough.

I’m not sure if this is gross or not. It’s sad, surely. It’s a tale of grief, mostly, and maybe about the desires birthed by grief. Was Josh grooming Adam? Is it wrong to smoke with your younger cousin? Ages are unclear. There’s a roughhousing scene that could be seen as boundary-pushing, but also, again, it’s unclear. And I think that’s part of the point maybe. Makes us think. It also makes sense to me that in the wake of his father’s death, a young boy would naturally look up to his older cousin with a sort of respect that borders on envy. This is not the type of envy that stings in a hateful way, it’s the kind of feeling that burns closer to fascination. I’ve felt this feeling before myself, albeit not with a family member. But humans are messy and grief is even messier, so what can you do. It’s a 30 minute short film.