Red, White and Royal Blue review: Choose Heartstopper over this
We’re still very much living in an era where more LGBTQ representation on screen can only be a good thing, and that is certainly the case with Matthew Lopez’s first feature film, Red, White & Royal Blue. This fantastical story about an unlikely pairing between the son of the President of the United States and a British prince is some much-needed queer romance, even if it the parts don’t always come together.
Matthew Lopez is most famous for directing West End play The Inheritance, a six-hour epic about the AIDS pandemic that The Telegraph called “play of the 21st century.” So it feels surprising that Lopez’s first feature is a glossy youth romance piece aimed at young adults. There’s nothing wrong with that; in our interview Lopez said he fell in love with the central Puerto Rican, working class character of Alex for how he is a different kind of LGBTQ lead quite unlike one that has been seen on screens before.
Read more: Red White and Royal Blue director Matthew Lopez on filming ‘tender’ gay sex scenes
Nicholas Galitzine and Taylor Zakhar Perez have decent chemistry as the two lovestruck guys in their mid-twenties, and it is enjoyable watching them flirt as their rampant horniness progresses. The film spares no blushes, with Alex losing his same-sex virginity in one passionate love making scene that feels brave and progressive and came together with the help of an intimacy coordinator.
The two go from frenemies to lovers, roaring around London together and pursuing each other as they attempt to shake off the paparazzi. It’s all a little too sugary-sweet, though, the film too often feeling bland instead of ground-breaking. And at two hours, it’s overlong.
Also, some of the couple’s interactions, like when they fall into a big cake together, feel written for teenage lovers, rather than two guys in their early-to-mid-twenties. Heartstopper, a Netflix LGBTQ drama, involves younger male leads, but feels like it deals more maturely and interestingly with queer themes, a sign that this film hasn’t quite worked out who its audience is.
Red White and Royal Blue is streaming now on Amazon