All Over the Guy is a better movie for what it isn't than for what it is. What it is is a fairly standard romantic comedy. The dialogue is sometimes brilliant, but the plot lacks structure. There are at least three pointless montages backed with music far more poignant and less cliched than the actual images, and one can't help but conclude that they were concocted to fill out the script.
On the other hand, the handling of the central gay relationship in the movie is refreshingly free of gay stereotypes. Oh, there are plenty of romantic comedy stereotypes, but I can hardly overemphasize how important this was to me as a gay man in viewing the film. Finally, a movie about a gay relationship that doesn't include any disco music, not a single gay bar scene, no quirky nelly "girlfriend," and where blatant emotional disregard for one's sexual partners is actually seen as a problem rather than an ambivalently accepted community standard. Of course, the cynic in me says that it's just because the gay relationship was adapted from a straight relationship in the play, but at the risk of horrifying my peers, I'd say maybe more screenwriters should use that technique when writing gay relationships. All's I know is that the result was that the romance felt closer to my own experience, and consequently more sympathetic and more true than 99% of the tarted up, histrionically dramatic gay relationships in popular media.
On the other hand, the handling of the central gay relationship in the movie is refreshingly free of gay stereotypes. Oh, there are plenty of romantic comedy stereotypes, but I can hardly overemphasize how important this was to me as a gay man in viewing the film. Finally, a movie about a gay relationship that doesn't include any disco music, not a single gay bar scene, no quirky nelly "girlfriend," and where blatant emotional disregard for one's sexual partners is actually seen as a problem rather than an ambivalently accepted community standard. Of course, the cynic in me says that it's just because the gay relationship was adapted from a straight relationship in the play, but at the risk of horrifying my peers, I'd say maybe more screenwriters should use that technique when writing gay relationships. All's I know is that the result was that the romance felt closer to my own experience, and consequently more sympathetic and more true than 99% of the tarted up, histrionically dramatic gay relationships in popular media.