Kaboom

The new Queer Cinema would be way less fun without Gregg Araki. This tale of polysexual college life threatened by cults and world annihilation falls into the category of old-school Araki (Totally F***ed Up, The Doom Generation) rather than the maturity of Mysterious Skin. Kaboom is an erotic blast of sinful flesh, fun and fantasy that you don’t want to stop.

Thomas Dekker stars as Smith, a film-studies major ‘undecided’ about his sexuality. Smith sleeps with a girl, the pert and free-spirited London (Juno Temple, daughter of director Julien and a sorceress of an actress). But he lusts for his straight, viking roomie Thor (Chris Zylka) who lies in bed naked, legs in the air, trying with the concentration of an Olympian to suck himself off. London has a theory about Smith, an alleged straight guy, and his anal way of arranging his shoes: ‘Aside from putting a dick in your mouth while listening to Lady Gaga, that’s about as gay as it gets.’

The plot morphs from strange to sci-fi surreal when Smith confides to his lezzie bestie, Stella (sass queen Haley Bennett), that he has a recurring dream of being menaced by men in animal masks, which may have something to do with Stella’s being stalked by a nympho witch (Roxane Mesquida). Got that? Don’t sweat it. Araki constructs the hot-blooded Kaboom as a high-wire act without a safety net. Go with it.

– Peter Travers, Rolling Stone