This is basically a dime-a-dozen coming-out story with all the usual ingredients: young and troubled teen in a traditional and gay-unfriendly surrounding desperately tries to hide his gay feelings, but in the course of the movie is forced by all kinds of circumstances to re-evaluate his life.
Unfortunately no-one in this movie is really sympathetic, so it's hard to team up with any of them, even with Sasha himself who evidently is the one that are heart should go out to. He's rather a drama-queen, he's unnecessary harsh to his little brother and blind to the feelings of his girlfriend. Sure, he has the excuse of being young and troubled, but still. The father is a terrible despotic bully, the mother is some sort of tyrant as well, in the way she forces Sasha to study the piano, and bff Jiao is more cranky than supportive. The climax of the movie comes a bit out of the blue and is over-dramatic, but the final reconciliation between father and son is poignantly pictured.
The actors playing the parents do a fine job, but the other characters (including Sasha) are played barely adequate. And to my regret the beautiful city of Cologne stays rather underexposed, we see mainly grey streets, a shabby bar and the worn-out family apartment.
All in all a bit of a disappointment, I've seen many other coming-out movies that moved me a lot more than this one. Maybe it's also the lack of any moral, catharsis or even some sort of satisfying ending: one wonders what Sasha in the end has learned or how the recent experiences have changed his life, it all stays rather in the dark.