The Miseducation Of Cameron Post

Though it’s set in the early 90s, this film has a lot of resonance in the current climate of moral debate and reignited religious fervour. 

Desiree Akhavan directs this film adaptation of Emily M. Danforth’s novel about a group of gay teenage girls and boys who are sent to a Christian aversion therapy camp called God’s Promise.

Cameron Post (Chloë Grace Moretz) is one such unfortunate teen. Orphaned and in the care of her aunt, she is caught with a girl in the back seat of her boyfriend’s car and duly enlisted at God’s Promise. There she meets a mixed bag of inmates, some committed to the cause of changing, like the self-deluded tom-boyish Erin (Emily Skeggs); some happily resigned to their “sickness” like the sassy Jane (Sasha Lane) and indifferent Adam (Forrest Goodluck). Dr Lydia Marsh (Jennifer Ehle – a deadringer for Meryl Streep) is the unyielding, Nurse Ratched like overseer and firm believer in the conversion technique, having already converted her brother Rick (John Gallagher Jr.).

There is a lot of humour and not too much preaching either way in this very watchable and sadly, still relevant film.

★★★ ½

Reviewed by Rita Bratovich