Timmy Thompson | Up on the Roof / 2023

love for hire

by Douglas Messerli

 

Timmy Thompson (screenwriter and director) Up on the Roof / 2023 [12 minutes]

 

It appears to be a first date, in which clearly Otis (Timmy Thompson) is more than a little uncomfortable. For example, even though the handsome Zane (Cole Newburg) tells him that he likes hanging out with him, there, on the rooftop beside a small pool, Otis isn’t quite convinced. It’s unsure whether Zane is just saying it make him feel well or really means it.

     Zane has evidently brought home some cookies, but Otis is uncomfortable even sharing them with Zane, having to make physical contact or even to share something with another. Otis, feeling more than a little self-conscious, suggests that Zane needed go through with “it,” presumably the date, if he doesn’t feel it’s worth it. But Zane reassures Otis that everything is fine, again telling him that he enjoys his company.

      He suggests a breathing exercise, just to calm Otis down, which confuses us slightly. What has happened to Otis? Has he just gone through a difficult relationship? Has he just come and afraid of the consequences?

      Perhaps in a bit in frustration, Zane removes his shoes and shirt and jumps into the heated pool with his pants still on, Otis troubled evidently by the possibility of nudity or even Zane’s stripping down to his jockey shorts.

      The water’s perfect, he argues, warmer than out there. But Otis won’t join him. In the 3 ft. wading pool, Zane ridiculously pretends to be drowning, pleading for help. But Otis only laughs and still won’t enter the pool. After a few more comic attempts, Otis finally decides to join him, also removing his shoes and shirt but leaving on his jeans.

     Once in the pool, he realizes that it actually cold, allowing Zane to warm him up by rubbing his back, and seems amendable to the other’s touches.

     Zane explains that one day his roommate had come to his room crying, perhaps the first time he’d every seen another man crying. It appeared that his roommate was having sexual problems with his girlfriend, and Zane stayed with him, apparently holding him and just talking. It finally made things better for his friend, and it made him happy as well for his ability to help.

      And we now begin to recognize, even if we haven’t previously that Zane is not some magical boyfriend who has accidently met up with Otis. He holds Otis’ nose for moment and takes him under the water, and follows it up two more times, Otis finally feeling safe in his arms and kissing him, laying his head upon Zane’s shoulder. It appears that finally Otis is again feeling joyful, that he feels truly loved.

       In the very next scene, we see Otis alone in elevator, on his way down, apparently to his room. His cellphone message thanks him for using the services of Zane Abrams, asking him that if he was happy with service to leave a tip.

       Clearly Zane was hired to help get Otis out of his funk; but it worked. The stranger was able to make him realize again that he was loveable.

 

Los Angeles, November 18, 2023

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (November 2023).