Negative Positive
Title: Didn't ring true.
Review: Bohjalian is too talented a writer to rely on something as inherently sensational as transgender relationships and sex change operations. He did approach the topic with something new to offer -- how the operation affects the people around the transexual. But he quickly devolves into the expected -- and butchers any chance he has of making a statement about the nature of sex and gender and relationships, and how gender can transcend the physical.The idea that a man could be handsome as a man and equally gorgeous as a woman is ludicrous -- as is the idea that a woman would "accept" that her ex-husband becomes involved with the man/woman she used to date. Add to that the fact that the voices of his characters all sound the same (even the college-aged girl sounds exactly the same as her mother).Bohjalian wrote this with a heavy hand, and in doing so lost any chance of creating a meaningful story.
Is the review positive or negative? 