Transamerica

2005

Action / Adventure / Comedy / Drama

10
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Rotten 83% · 145 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Upright 83% · 50K ratings
IMDb Rating 7.3/10 10 43203 43.2K

gay interest transsexuality sexual identity women's sexual identity new york city individual

Plot summary

A transgender woman takes an unexpected journey when she learns that she had a son, now a teenage runaway hustling on the streets of New York.

Director

Duncan Tucker Photo
Duncan Tucker

Top cast

Forrie J. Smith Photo
Forrie J. Smith as Sammy
Teala Dunn Photo
Teala Dunn as Little Girl
Danny Burstein Photo
Danny Burstein as Dr. Spikowsky
Graham Greene Photo
Graham Greene as Calvin
720p.BluRay 1080p.BluRay
947.93 MB
1280*682
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
24 fps
1 hr 43 min
Seeds 3
1.9 GB
1920*1024
English 5.1
NR
Subtitles us  
24 fps
1 hr 43 min
Seeds 11

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by noralee 7 / 10

An Amusing and Heartfelt Twist on the Cross-Country Mis-Matched Pair Genre

"Transamerica" follows the trajectory of the long tradition of road movies with opposites paired up on a voyage of self-discovery, with stops along the way to their pasts.The gimmick here recalls "Broken Flowers"s trip when another biological father discovers a son. Here, it's not just that the person who produced the sperm is on the verge of transsexual completion that helps the film rise above various genre clichés (there was more than passing similarity to scenes from such films as "The Sure Thing," "Smoke Signals," and "Midnight Run" in debut writer/director Duncan Tucker's script, plus unfortunate throwback images of the south from "Deliverance" and way over-the-top dysfunctional families, and some Native American commentary on transsexuals coinciding with a convenient appearance by the ever estimable Graham Greene.) As graphically embodied in two terrific performances, "Bree" (Felicity Huffman as née "Stanley") and the new-found son "Toby" have opposite relations to their bodies. Having felt like a stealth woman trapped in a man's body, "Bree" is naive to the pleasures of the flesh and is used to having to be wrapped up tight in her struggle to control normality that has impeded every part of her life. "Toby" is an abused gay hustler who probably for good reason and profit assumes that people of either gender or those in-between are responding to him physically (and Kevin Zegers is such an unfettered, tousled Adonis that he is even more sensual than Joseph Gordon-Levitt's somewhat similar screwed-up kid in "Mysterious Skin"). Both have had only negative experiences with family, as we see along the way, and both have a lot to learn about the parent/child relationship and honesty. While it makes it too easy for the audience's perception to have the transsexual be played by an actress (like Vanessa Redgrave as Renee Richards or Olympia Dukakis in "Tales of the City" or Famke Janssen on "Nip/Tuck" vs. Terence Stamp in "The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert") with only two momentary reversion lapses to masculine mannerisms played for laughs and revelation, at least for more realism "Bree" is not in the arts or some high-powered white-collar job. There were a lot of chuckles throughout the film, but I was surprised that not all of the folks at the crowded opening weekend matinée of a very mixed gay and straight audience joined in. (Though the two guys next to me who had been discussing "Lord of the Rings" just before the film started were uproarious at "Toby"s analysis of the gay sub-text in that story.) It was a cheap shot for easy laughs to have "Bree" be half-Jewish.While I thought it was for symbolism that the two have a key stop-over in Phoenix, it turns out that was filmed at the director's parents' house in Arizona. I presume the kid's concluding black cowboy hat and blond hair is a bit of an homage to "Midnight Cowboy."The soundtrack selections are excellent reflections of the environments the characters are in, from Latin in California, to hip hop in New York to a lovely range of Southern country and gospel, moving through Texas with a Lucinda Williams track, Native American in New Mexico, with a beautiful new Dolly Parton song over the credits that should get an Oscar nomination.
Reviewed by quis89 8 / 10

A quirky, poignant film about taboos

This movie may not be for the faint of heart. I'm sure it has offended plenty, and may have even been filmed with the intention of offending some. But this is a movie that I think really _needed_ to be made. The first step to destroying taboos is to bring them out in the open. This film deals with, obviously, trans-sexuality, in a very human way - issues about what it is to be a woman, and whether trans-sexuality is a psychological disorder (as Brie says in the beginning, isn't it odd for a psychological disorder to be cured with plastic surgery?). In the periphery it also deals with prostitution, drug abuse, homosexuality, incest, family acceptance, and honesty.Transamerica skips ably from comedy to drama, and you'll find yourself laughing riotously at points("The Church of the Potential Father" got an lol from me) and perhaps crying at points. It deals with hard topics in a frank and touching way. I found it very interesting that they chose to portray Brie with a female actress as opposed to a m-to-f or male actress. I'm not sure if it's simply because of Felicity Huffman's fame after Desperate Housewives, or as yet another comment on the nature of sexuality/gender - she's a woman playing a man who is a woman...As somebody who is very liberal, accepting, and already somewhat knowledgeable about lgbt topics, I found this an extremely moving portrait of what it is to be in a gender/sexuality-gray area in America. But, you really would need to go into this movie with an open mind to fully appreciate it. My sister, for instance, watched the first 10 minutes, commented "That's weird....." and left. Well, her loss.
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