Boys Don't Cry

Now comes the cherry on the immortality cake, Kimberly Pierce's brilliant dramatic rendition of the tale of the girl who would be a man and love as one.

Pierce was honest enough to take a hard look at the set of circumstances surrounding Brandon's death. One might say that through her artistic integrity she stumbled on the general tragedy surrounding the individual tragedy.

Scene after scene takes place on several emotional levels at once, with love, hate, confusion, courage, yearning, hopelessness, strength, and desperation all thrown into the mix.

Despite being one of the first major films to grapple with being transgender in America, Boys Don't Cry is neither self-congratulatory, heavy-handed, nor exploitative.