Will & Harper

[Spartan Girl]

I just watched Will and Harper on Netflix. Say what you want about Will Ferrell, but he is a damn good friend to Harper. Whether or not you actually know someone who is trans, this is a much watch.

[Annber03]

I've heard about that documentary, yeah! It sounds really good - respect to Ferrell for doing this. 

[Shannon L.]

I was just coming here to mention Will and Harper.  I thought it was great.  Poignant, sad, eye opening, loving, frustrating.... It's a really good (and important) movie.  

[Spartan Girl]

11 minutes ago, Shannon L. said:

I was just coming here to mention Will and Harper.  I thought it was great.  Poignant, sad, eye opening, loving, frustrating.... It's a really good (and important) movie.  

I couldn’t believe how nice the people in that Oklahoma dive bar were to Harper. When I saw those Confederate flags and people staring at her, I feared the worst, but they were surprisingly cool—even before Will came inside.

But the Texas restaurant fiasco made me see red. All those people acting polite in person only to post those disgusting tweets…fucking cowards. 

[Shannon L.]

9 minutes ago, Spartan Girl said:

I couldn’t believe how nice the people in that Oklahoma dive bar were to Harper. When I saw those Confederate flags and people staring at her, I feared the worst, but they were surprisingly cool—even before Will came inside.

But the Texas restaurant fiasco made me see red. All those people acting polite in person only to post those disgusting tweets…fucking cowards. 

Me, too. And I think Will learned a hard lesson there. He was in Texas, being playful, wearing that costume, and announcing her as if his playfulness and his name would make it easier. His tears when talking about it were telling. I don't know what he was thinking-that was a dangerous situation for both of them, but especially Harper. I think it hit him at that moment they were talking about it. 

[Spartan Girl]

1 minute ago, Shannon L. said:

Me, too. And I think Will learned a hard lesson there. He was in Texas, being playful, wearing that costume, and announcing her as if his playfulness and his name would make it easier. His tears when talking about it were telling. I don't know what he was thinking-that was a dangerous situation for both of them, but especially Harper. I think it hit him at that moment they were talking about it. 

Yeah, but at the same time, I don’t think he’s to blame for their vitriol. Even if he hadn’t been wearing a costume and announcing himself, somebody still would have taken a photo and posted it on the internet, and the trolls would come out of their holes.

[Shannon L.]

24 minutes ago, Spartan Girl said:

Yeah, but at the same time, I don’t think he’s to blame for their vitriol. Even if he hadn’t been wearing a costume and announcing himself, somebody still would have taken a photo and posted it on the internet, and the trolls would come out of their holes.

Oh, I didn't mean to make it sound like he was to blame!  I just think that he realized after the fact that being silly in that situation wasn't exactly the best choice. 

[AheadofStraight]

I'm surprised not to see a thread for this yet. I really enjoyed it! I'm neutral on Will in general (I love some of his stuff and some just annoys the hell out of me) but I thought he was pretty fantastic in this. I definitely shed a few tears!

Trailer:

 

[chediavolo]

Was pretty good. I think Will Ferrell did a good job of just continuing to love his friend no matter what and not acting too shocked, considering this seemingly came out of the blue for him. His friend had never talked to him about transitioning before. I don’t know if I would have been able to be so cool about it without sounding like a bumbling fool at times. 

[Bastet]

On 9/29/2024 at 4:51 PM, Spartan Girl said:

I couldn’t believe how nice the people in that Oklahoma dive bar were to Harper. When I saw those Confederate flags and people staring at her, I feared the worst, but they were surprisingly cool—even before Will came inside.

I was blown away by that, too.  People were welcoming at the race they went too, as well.  She was so afraid of those people - and, having relatives in Oklahoma, I was afraid of them on her behalf - but it turned out well.  Texas, on the other hand, lived down to its reputation; not even Will Ferrel as Sherlock Holmes was going to keep that from being a shitshow.

This was a good watch.  There were a couple of times I feared Will was going to make it about himself, but he was generally good about centering Harper.

Harper's sister is fantastic.  "Great, I've always wanted a sister."  Knowing it was important to reply right away, so Harper knew she didn't need any time to think about it.

I was moved by Harper's conversation with another woman who transitioned late in life, talking about how their voices cause both of them to be misgendered a lot.  Their differing reactions to that were interesting to hear -- Harper doesn't like her voice because of that, and the other woman initially didn't, either, was taking vocal lessons to try to change it, but then decided she was doing that for the comfort of others, not for herself, and her voice is her voice, and she likes it as it is, despite the misgendering that often results.

How much transphobia gets internalized, so that Harper knows transitioning saved her life and is the happiest she's ever been, yet still fears hating herself and still has "You're a freak" thoughts, is heartbreaking. 

And, with transpeople in as much legal and physical danger as they've ever been, it was good for a big focus of this to be how Harper now has to make careful calculations about whether something is safe enough to risk doing, when she never had to give a single thought about safety when wandering the country and striking up conversations in bars and truck stops in the middle of nowhere as a man.  Even with Will with her, or waiting outside, she has to make that calculation every time.

Kristen Wiig's song was funny and sweet.

[Bastet]

On 9/30/2024 at 3:20 PM, AheadofStraight said:

I'm surprised not to see a thread for this yet.

It's being discussed in the Documentaries thread in Movies (it was released to select theatres before dropping on Netflix), starting here.  I think, because of that theatrical release, Movies is where it belongs, but, if so, I'd love to see this film have its own thread there.  I've asked the admins if that's where it should go, and if this thread can just be moved there if so.

[DanaK]

5 minutes ago, Bastet said:

It's being discussed in the Documentaries thread in Movies (it was released to select theatres before dropping on Netflix), starting here.  I think, because of that theatrical release, Movies is where it belongs, but, if so, I'd love to see this film have its own thread there.  I've asked the admins if that's where it should go, and if this thread can just be moved there if so.

This happens all the time with theatrical docs that make it to streaming or TV so it isn’t unusual to be here

[Irlandesa]

On 10/1/2024 at 12:31 PM, chediavolo said:

Was pretty good. I think Will Ferrell did a good job of just continuing to love his friend no matter what and not acting too shocked, considering this seemingly came out of the blue for him.

I'm sure he was shocked when he first received the email.  By the time they made this, he'd had two or three years to adjust to the news.  But that's what was so lovely about what Harper did.  Telling people by email gave everyone the chance to absorb the news and craft a supportive response even if they still felt a little shocked by it. 

I thought this was such a good idea for a documentary.  Like many people, I know trans men and women but they'd all already transitioned by the time I met them.  I think I could listen to them spend hours discussing how much or how little their decades-long friendship changed post-transition.

I was so sad to hear that Harper received such poor care from a therapist. I thought she was going to say it was decades ago but it was only 7 years ago.

 

[Bastet]

18 minutes ago, Irlandesa said:

Telling people by email gave everyone the chance to absorb the news and craft a supportive response even if they still felt a little shocked by it. 

I said in the Documentaries thread discussion of this film that Harper's sister is fantastic, knowing it was important to respond quickly even though she wasn't sure what to say, so Harper knew she didn't need to think about it in order to have a positive response.  And then writing "I've always wanted a sister."

19 minutes ago, Irlandesa said:

I was so sad to hear that Harper received such poor care from a therapist. I thought she was going to say it was decades ago but it was only 7 years ago.

I'm glad you mentioned that because it's something I forgot to note in the other thread -- I appreciated that scene between Harper and a retired therapist, when Harper sharing her own terrible experience with a therapist confirms what the retired therapist has long known, that she failed her client.

Therapists may be educated and trained professionals, but they still exist in this society of rampant bigotry, and many of them aren't any good at checking their biases at the door.  Women are subjected to a lot of terribly sexist feedback (even when the therapist is a woman, due to internalized misogyny), so I'm sadly unsurprised that a client indicating gender dysphoria could be outright dismissed like that.

[Shannon L.]

11 hours ago, Irlandesa said:

I thought this was such a good idea for a documentary.

I did, too.  I loved that no questions were off limits because I know there are a lot of people, even those who are allies of the LGBTQ+ communities, who still have questions that they are afraid to ask.  

What struck me on a personal level, was when he was talking about first getting into sports to appear more manly.  My favorite uncle was gay and tried for decades to hide it and even spent time trying to change.  My mom told me at one point that he and his oldest son struggled a lot when his son was young because he kept pushing things on him like sports and asking girls out.  During that time, it was thought that being gay was more about nurture than nature, and since my uncle, being the only son, was treated very much like a girl, he thought that treating his son more like a "man" would keep him from a difficult life like he'd been living.  Once my uncle came out, though, and after some therapy for him and his kids, he and his son became close.  

This was the difficulty of someone that age being gay--I can't even imagine how frightening it must be to finally come out as transgender and to start transitioning. 

[AheadofStraight]

On 9/29/2024 at 7:51 PM, Spartan Girl said:

I couldn’t believe how nice the people in that Oklahoma dive bar were to Harper. When I saw those Confederate flags and people staring at her, I feared the worst, but they were surprisingly cool—even before Will came inside.

But the Texas restaurant fiasco made me see red. All those people acting polite in person only to post those disgusting tweets…fucking cowards. 

I immediately wondered how much of the niceness was due to the presence of cameras.