A Little Closer

In his visually powerful debut film, the young American director Matthew Petock intercuts three stories about members of a family on the edge of society wrestling with the cruelty of love.
Sheryl, a single mother, is desperately looking for a new man who can be a father to her two sons. She goes to a weekly dating evening in the hope of meeting her dream prince. Sheryl’s eldest son Marc (16) is still a virgin and gets sexual advice from the older boy Don. When he asks 15-year-old Joanna for a date and she says yes, he decides to do everything possible to have sex with her.
And then there’s the youngest son, Stephen (12), who falls in love with the teacher everybody hates. As a result he really puts the loyalty of his classmates to the test. The family members have similar problems, but that does not bring them closer together - Petock cleverly makes the distance between them tangible.