Come As You Are

Films about disability tend to fall into one of two camps: worthy and respectful, or pointedly unworthy and disrespectful. Belgian comedy (yes, such a thing exists) ‘Come As You Are’ does an extremely good job of tightroping between the two. It’s the tale of three friends – paralysed Philip (Robrecht Vanden Thoren), terminally ill Lars (Gilles de Schryver) and near-blind Jozef (Tom Audenaert) as they break their lifelong parental bonds and head for Spain in search of nookie. The characters are superbly sketched and performed, and the treatment of disability is tactful but never precious. We believe in these men, in their bitterness and frustration. So it’s a shame that, after a promising start, the script descends into road movie cliché and cheap manipulation, leading to an unnecessary and overblown climax. The problem is that writer Pierre de Clercq and director Geoffrey Enthoven are trying to do too much, to construct a character comedy, a tragedy, a sex farce and a political tract all at once. It’s a confused film but very likeable.