Goat

The scenes of humiliation and random punishment in Andrew Neel's Goat, based on Brad Land's titular 2004 memoir about hazing at a college fraternity, are not merely harrowing but physically difficult to watch. The ugliness here is intended to reveal the grotesque mindset that enjoys inflicting pain, summed up in a cameo by James Franco, who appears briefly as a gung-ho alum symbolizing the ridiculously macho camaraderie of the Phi Sigma Mu brothers. The narrative centers on freshman pledge Brad (Ben Schnetzer), who chooses to suffer the brutality in an apparent bid to reassert his shattered manhood after meekly enduring a savage beating by thugs the year before. Nick Jonas plays Brad's older brother Brett, a member of the frat who becomes disgusted watching his sibling being debased for the pleasure of others. While both leads give strong performances, the story itself offers relatively few surprises. The chapter president (Gus Halper) and pledge master (Jake Picking) are both smug, one-note villains, while Brad's roommate and fellow pledge Will (Danny Flaherty) is the weakling whose predictable fate will inevitably invite an institutional crackdown. More interesting is the relationship between Brad and Brett—a bond that remains fascinating even when their motivations aren't completely clear. Frat life is often thought to build character and engender lifelong friendships; despite its flaws, Goat offers a disturbing glimpse of the darker side. Recommended. (F. Swietek)