Eddie (Fionn O’Shea) and Amber (Lola Petticrew) are two young people heading towards their final days of high school. Their paths have barely crossed, and they hardly know each other – but they soon realise how much they need each other, since they both carry a secret neither one of them is willing to admit publicly: they’re both gay. This wouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone, since their working-class Irish high school is populated by foul-mouthed bullies who make sure to assert their own predictions to their classmates’ predilections regularly. Not wanting to address these issues right away, especially since both are hoping to escape their town and move onto better lives elsewhere – Eddie is training to join the military, while Amber is yearning to move to London and live a bohemian life, editing a zine and living her life as a free-spirited punk amongst like-minded individuals – the duo decides to hide their sexualities by entering into a relationship with each other, throwing off the scent of their preferences, and hopefully getting their peers to stop projecting their own insecurities on two people who are just trying to make their way through the last few weeks of their banal suburban existence. However, what starts as a relationship of convenience flourishes into something more complex, since Amber views it as a way of satiating the criticisms of her friends and family, being assured in her own sexuality, while Eddie is far more torn, with his ultimate intention being to impress his family, including his conservative commandant father (Barry Ward), and his sensitive but loving mother (Sharon Horgan), neither of which he believes would be able to handle having a son that doesn’t fit into their preconceived mould of what a solid Irish man should be. Eddie and Amber find themselves extracting far more from this faux relationship than they expected, and discover that even without attraction, there is still a solid love that occurs between them, a passionate friendship that helps them through this difficult period of their lives.

Youth is a difficult time for many of us, because not only do we have to acclimate to the inevitable challenges that lie ahead of us, it’s a time of self-discovery, where we all embark on a voyage in finding who we are. Some tend to find themselves far more easily, and whether it be due to the fact that they fit into the ideal model of their particular society by default, or because they work relentlessly to become a part of it, they tend to have it a lot easier. Dating Amber is about the very people who occur on the other side of the proverbial tracks, the outsiders and rejects who never quite fit in, and who worry that they never will. This is the central driving force behind David Freyne’s exceptionally funny and often achingly beautiful comedy, who ventures into some striking territory in its exploration of the lives of two young people who are discovering themselves in the midst of a society that is already in flux (with the film being situated in 1995, right before the end of The Troubles, which tore the country apart), which only makes their journey to finding their own identity and coming to terms with the fact that they aren’t ever going to be a part of the ideal society, all the more difficult. Yet, Dating Amber is not a film about lamenting how people like Eddie and Amber can’t fit in, but more of a celebration of the fact that they shouldn’t even want to be a part of the system in the first place – and through heartfelt comedy, tear-jerking emotion and some incredible performances (particularly from young actors like Fionn O’Shea and Lola Petticrew, who give truly impressive portrayals of the complex protagonists here, and are certainly destined to become very promising voices in contemporary acting), complemented by a razor-sharp script, this film is an absolute triumph, a comedy that can be outrageously funny at one moment, and then truly shattering the next – and finding the balance between emotions while executing such a daring story is more than enough to qualify Freyne’s work here as being enormously successful, and truly one of the year’s most endearing surprises.

Artistic representation of issues relating to the LGBTQIA+ community have been prevalent almost as long as film as existed, only being shrewdly concealed behind allusion and implication for the first half of its existence, before an emergence of underground film, and more intrepid filmmakers willing to have frank discussions on sexuality, made it normal to address these issues without needing to hide it behind a veneer, in fears of censorship or punishment. Mercifully, these very human stories have gradually begun entering into more prominent discussions over the past three decades, and while they’re not nearly as mainstream as they should be (despite considerable leaps forward with very recent films like Call Me By Your Name and Love, Simon), they’re carving out a space for themselves within the populist discourse that is becoming increasingly more difficult for cynics to silence. Dating Amber is a one of the more upbeat, buoyant entries into the canon of queer cinema, one that may not be particularly serious (and has a few narrative problems that can only be attributed to the desire to make this as convenient and effortless as possible), but still has a heart to rival the most poignant films on these matters. This is a film that occurs squarely in the middle of two extremes – it is neither serious enough to be considered a thorough exploration of these matters, but it does have a raw undercurrent pulsating throughout it, a daring approach to presenting us with a frank and earnest depiction of the intersections between adolescence and sexuality, both in terms of carnal and emotional desires. Unflinching in its portrayal of teenage romance, including honest portrayals of lust (which are often shoved into the background in more toothless comedies about queer issues, almost as if it is the boundary that can’t be overcome), but so thoroughly effervescent in how it presents it without even an iota of exploitative pretention, Dating Amber just works so exceptionally well in the context of a story that truly benefits from a more direct depiction of its central themes.

It may appear like Dating Amber is being celebrated for meeting the bare necessities – after all, this isn’t much more than a run-of-the-mill teen comedy about two young people forming a relationship to solve a problem. The difference comes in the fact that the problem they’re facing isn’t anything inherently funny or troubling, but simply their own identity. Freyne masterfully avoids having a discussion on the “gay panic”, or any other socio-cultural issue that portrays the queer community as anything other than normal, and something to be feared, through not necessarily villainizing those opposed to the central characters’ and their (alleged) preferences, but rather just narrow-minded charlatans who can’t look beyond their own myopic upbringing to realize that deviance from the norm isn’t something to fear, but rather a cause to celebrate, since diversity has rarely ever been a negative force in any space. Emphasis is also taken off the protagonists’ struggles with their sexuality – Amber is a free-spirited young woman who doesn’t pay attention to the dissenting voices, while Eddie is comfortable with who he is, but rather struggles to reconcile his identity with his aims for the future. The film admirably avoids so many tropes, and through oscillations between outrageous comedy and some truly tender moments of unparalleled beauty (such as in the nightclub that forms the turning point for the film’s narrative, or between the characters and the individuals that help them realize their desires and come to terms with their identities), there is so much underlying this film that separates it from more innocuous depictions of queer issues – and most notably, the director makes sure to not view the community as a homogenous mass, but rather a large group of varied souls that go through different challenges, two of which form the basis of this film, which makes for a very compelling and heartwarming exploration of the many journeys taken to reach the point of self-acceptance.

Based on just a brief glance, Dating Amber doesn’t seem like much – its bright colours and irreverent, bubbly humour may mislead you into thinking that this is just another entertaining but vacuous exercise in trivializing gay issues for the sake of the public’s enjoyment. However, lurking just out of sight is a fact that becomes increasingly clear as the film progresses, where we see that there is so much more complexity to what Freyne is doing with this story, which may not be evident based on the form it takes. There’s certainly not a shortage of hilarity in this film, and the manner of heightening the coming-of-age drama with some very peculiar comedy (such as the opening scene being one of the main characters obliviously riding his scooter through crossfire, unaware of the conflict happening just behind him) only serves to make Dating Amber an even more enduring piece of storytelling, the kind of film that may not shatter boundaries or cause entire mentalities to shift, but rather helps normalize these stories – it’s not groundbreaking filmmaking, nor is it anything we haven’t seen in some form before, but instead functions as a reminder that these stories are worth telling, and should be given the space to flourish. Sentimental without being saccharine, hilarious without any sense of callousness, and a beautifully simple execution that really pulls everything together and makes Dating Amber a true gem, and one that reminds all of us of the importance of living your life authentically and pursuing your ambitions, and how its the responsibility of everyone to make the world a little bit easier for members of this community to flourish and be themselves.