Its coming-of-age yarn goes nowhere beyond inevitably out of a closet.

| Original Score: 2/4 | May 19, 2006

This gay coming-of-age film from Germany ultimately has few original aspects, but it is an intelligently wrought drama that makes it a respectable entry in the genre.

Full Review | May 10, 2006

Stadlober, a young Austrian actor cast in the leading role, is charming enough to survive most of the movie's labored attempts to lighten up.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Mar 31, 2006

While it has little in it that hasn't been covered by other coming-out movies, it's pleasant enough.

Full Review | Original Score: C+ | Mar 30, 2006

Kreutzpainter limns his multifarious characters with an amiable, unforced humor and an authentic feel for the ways in which good kids respond to peer pressure with less-than-admirable behavior.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Mar 24, 2006

Equal parts earnest and endearing, Bavarian director Marco Kreuzpaintner's gay romance tackles its adolescent heartaches with unusual compassion.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Mar 24, 2006

The slo-mo opening, accompanied by sappy music, tells you everything you need to know about Summer Storm, an uninspired gay coming-of-age import from Germany.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4 | Mar 24, 2006

Summer Storm is another of those soft-core, simple-minded stories about a geeky young gay man (Robert Stadlober as Tobi) struggling with his sexuality over the course of a long, hot, sexed-up summer.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Mar 23, 2006

For a small coming-of-age film, this picture is remarkably well photographed and acted. But the single-mindedness with which it seems determined to have almost everyone rowing in the same sexual direction finally becomes a bit oppressive.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Mar 23, 2006

Summer Storm is a contemporary teen summer romance with a modern sexual twist -- though in many ways, it's just the same old malarkey.

Full Review | Original Score: 1.5/4 | Mar 23, 2006

A lovely wallow in the sweaty pains and joys of mostly gay adolescent love.

Full Review | Mar 23, 2006

One of the film's major assets is Stadlober's winningly natural performance -- his moody charisma is irresistible.

| Mar 21, 2006

Though the characters and plot are all paint-by-numbers, Summer Storm is still a fairly charming look at what it's like for a typical teen jock to admit he's not so typical, after all.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Mar 17, 2006

Tale of a high-school rowing team's captain going through major changes during a week-long training retreat is routine in some aspects, but compensates via psychologically sharp writing and performances.

| Mar 17, 2006

Someone should tell the poor guy that being gay doesn't have to mean being this lame.

Full Review | Original Score: C- | Mar 15, 2006

Hey, Toby, I know what you did last summer: you went gay!

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Apr 25, 2005