Dating Amber

Dating Amber is a comedy set against the political turmoil of 1995 Ireland. Its two lead characters are an effeminate boy and a slightly feral lesbian. If you’re like me, you might be saying “hey, that sounds kind of like Derry Girls.” And you’d not be wrong. But Derry Girls doesn’t own the patent on 90s Irish homosexual teenagers. And anyway, I for one welcome and indeed demand more funny 90s Irish lesbians in pop culture.

The film’s lead characters are Amber, a self-assured teen lesbian and the still closeted and less assured male homosexual, Eddie. Both Amber and Eddie experience homophobic bullying from their peers. This leads them to a scheme where they pretend to date as a way to assure others of their staunch heterosexuality. For Eddie especially, this is a great relationship. Heavily closeted and experiencing a great deal of shame, Amber helps show Eddie aspects of queer culture and the general concept that being gay isn’t the end of the world. However, Eddie, struggling under the weight of largely self-imposed toxic masculinity has a hard time accepting this. While Amber plans to leave their small town for London, Eddie’s plan is to join the military and repress all of his homosexual feelings.

Dating Amber lists Lola Petticrew and Fionn O’shea as co-leads. And while Amber gets nearly equal screen time, realistically, Eddie is the main character. He has way more of an arc. Dating Amber has both comedy and drama elements and Eddie ends up carrying more of the dramatic weight. This particular portrayal of internalized homophobia is really heavy and raw. Eddie’s desperation, misplaced anger and overall agony over being gay is truly devastating to watch. It’s a good portrayal of how this sort of internalized homophobia doesn’t just affect the individual. When Eddie lashes out, his rage is almost always targeted at other queer individuals.

Amber, by contrast is a much lighter character. I’m glad that as a lesbian, this character is obviously the one I relate to more because it does make the movie easier to view as a comedy. Relating most to Eddie would be devastating. Amber, by contrast, is quite self-assured and comfortable with her identity for a teen lesbian in 1995. Good for her! Amber has a lot of great one-liners and I like her character but realistically, she is a platonic manic pixie dream girl or helpful gay best friend for Eddie. She’s this counter-cultural weirdo here to introduce him to gay culture and motivate him to do things. At the end of the film she even gives him her life savings so he and he alone can get out of their town and strike out on his own.

Dating Amber is successful as both comedy and drama for the very simple reason that both jokes and serious moments land. Moments like Eddie hiding his homosexuality by saying, “I’m gay for your boobs,” and the 90s Catholic school sex ed video the kids watch got a genuine laugh out of me. The basic concept of preformative heterosexuality taken to a comedic extreme really works too. What also works is even in the comedic moments, there is a darkness to a lot of the jokes. There’s a real one joke between me and a breakdown type energy here. This does help as the core story here is pretty dark. Heavier moments especially involving Eddie’s self-loathing do hit really hard. At one point Amber tells Eddie that staying in their small town will kill him. It’s very clear that this is not an exaggeration and is truly heart breaking.

Dating Amber works on a lot of levels. It’s funny, it’s tragic and it shows how much gay acceptance has come in 26 years and that we still have a ways to go. Lola Pettcrew and Fionn O’Shea give great performances as likeable teen gays who are great non-romantic scene partners. This is both a crowd pleasing film but one with some actual depth and things to say about being gay both in a specific time and place but also as a general identity.

Overall rating: 7.6/10

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