Swain balances the personal and the political, allowing his film to be intimate while keeping a larger perspective. It is refreshing to see people on screen who are living in a real world.

So well is this film made, written and acted that you’d have to be a pretty big hard ass not to get pulled into the hilarious and even touching exploits of Alan and Tommy as their lives take the most unpredictable of turns. Try it, you’ll like it!

If the film had allowed them to fall in love in real time, instead of to the drumbeat of history, their relationship would seem immeasurably more nuanced.

Call it a weepy for the gay community:The Trip is an oddly marketed, oddly titled romance. Yes, there is a trip, but it takes place during the last 15 minutes of the film and seems almost tangential.

Riddled with romantic and political cliches but is often redeemed by the charismatic performances of Braun and Sullivan.

Ten tumultuous years in the history of the gay rights movement serve as the backdrop for this warm, engaging romantic comedy.

Uses lots of stock footage and takes looks back at America's big transitional period as though the era came in a can.

It doesn't help that Sullivan has twice as much screen time and half as much charisma as Braun.

Much of the action is strident and cartoonish -- but the romance at the core remains tender and true.

Throughout, Sullivan and Braun shine, making for a match so sexy and appealing that it's a shame Swain avoids their love life, an approach that doesn't exactly advance gay liberation -- or cinema.

The story's third-act detour into tragedy is predictable and unwelcome, providing a resolution that is too pat and familiar to be moving.

The cataclysmic changes in attitude and lifestyles the characters pass through at irregular intervals from 1973 to 1984... seem to consist wholly of changes in hairstyle that look as wildly stereotyped and inauthentic as the gestures and lines that accompany them.

With its implausible coincidences, inelegant plot twists and minimally characterized characters, The Trip doesn't have much going for it apart from its basic sincerity and decency, which are evident.

Steals every trick in the gaysploitation book down to the Alexis Arquette glorified cameo, but the end result -- compulsively horrible and full of unintentional poignant hilarity -- is its own mutant creature.