Ben (Corey Fogelmanis) likes to wear oversized, dark-toned hoodies. Allowing their lanky, frail frame to be swallowed by the heaviness of the fabric, they have become adept at mascing their burgeoning gender fluidity, until the day they bravely take off the hood for their religious and conservative parents to see.

Adapted by Tommy Dorfman from the Mason Deaver novel of the same name, I Wish You All the Bestgets so much inherently right about the tactility of trans self-actualization. Intrinsically subverting the coming-of-age high school sub-genre by simple virtue of its queer protagonist, the film is an agonizing and euphoric expression of queerness in all of its delightful, painful, glorious fullness.

I Wish You All The Best Is A Rare Expression Of Teenage Transness

From the moment the film begins, with Ben wiping away the condensation on a bathroom mirror to (literally) reveal themself, Dorfman paves the path for a cogently poetic portrait of burgeoning selfhood. Her direction and writing can, jarringly, vacillate between the subtle stings of a gendered world and overly articulated emotional beats. But when it gets it right, it really gets it right, as in an early scene when Ben comes home to his mother, Brenda (Amy Landecker), and is labeled a “sweet boy” with a “handsome face,” seemingly innocuous terms that must hurt for someone discovering who they are.

Coming out to their parents does not go well, and soon Ben is in the street, in 30-degree weather, frantically calling their estranged older sister, Hannah (Alexandria Daddario), whom they have not seen in ten years. An outcast from their abusive parents herself, Hannah has made a new life for herself with husband Thomas (Cole Sprouse), a high school chemistry teacher, and their newborn, Cyrus. Why Hannah has escaped their parents is momentarily elusive, but she and Thomas warmly welcome Ben in as if no time has passed.

Thomas forges a letter from Ben and Hannah’s parents allowing the runaway to register as a student at his high school, North Wake, a school so progressive that some students have started calling it “North Woke.” There, Ben quickly finds their place within Nathan’s circle (a luminous Miles Gutierrez-Riley), an out bisexual student and inevitable love interest. So, too, does Ben get welcomed in by Ms. Lyons (Lena Dunham), the school’s charmingly messy art teacher. Dunham is wonderful, but the character does feel overwritten in the mold of quirky teacher role-model archetypes.

While Hannah and Thomas do what they can, their financial constraints force Ben to find a job at the Perennial Days Senior Center under the management of Chris (Brian Michael Smith), where they find comfort in supporting art therapy for Alzheimer’s and dementia patients. At night, in secret, Ben delights in the feel of a silk nightie and experiments with lip gloss. Though Ben isn’t terribly shy about admitting his sexual queerness, his gender queerness remains under wraps until Ms. Lyons encourages him to let himself be more fully seen.

Dorfman’s film is at its best when she lets the characters breathe in their identities. There’s an inherent healing power to a scene in which Ben comes out as non-binary to Hannah and Thomas, the latter of whom replies with a simple, “Alright, buddy... what’s that feel like?” As a trans filmmaker, Dorfman must understand herself the ways in which so many people can cause damage in their response to a budding flower like Ben, and with a simple, slow camera push and dialogue as delicate as this, I Wish You All the Best acts as a warm coaxing.

In less strong ways, the film traffics in clichés or else underserves its tertiary characters. There are one too many montages, for example, which makes the film feel rushed towards its inevitable conclusion. At a party, the film presents all the requisite rites of passage for a junior in high school: weed, alcohol, sex. Perhaps it’s best to get them all out in one go, but the film does want for subtler touches throughout. The relationship between Ben and Hannah, while sweet, never really reads as estrangement.

Further, Dorfman tries a bit too hard to manufacture tension where it doesn’t exactly need to be. There’s a sudden moment of disagreement between Ben and Thomas that comes out of nowhere, and some third-act fighting between Ben and Nathan that doesn’t seem entirely justified. Brad Oberhofer’s score is treacly and saccharine in a way that never lets us breathe. But, given that the film’s focii is so exceedingly rare within the genre, there’s a refreshing subversion to its surface-level simplicity.

Fogelmanis is a revelation as Ben. His openness is alternately heartbreaking and joyous. He effectively straddles the line between a traumatized young person and a growing adult. Through him, we easily identify with Ben, giving Dorfman the emotional anchor the film needs. This is the kind of film that, by its very nature, has power in its reflection. With bi-erasure and transphobia both ballooning, I Wish You All The Best comes with a strong message of hope: that you, too, can be an awkward, flailing teen. That awkwardness is not exclusive to those who fit a traditional mold, and that we all deserve a chance to mess up.

Release Date March 8, 2024

Runtime 92 Minutes

Director Tommy Dorfman

Writers Mason Deaver, Tommy Dorfman