Shobha Nirvan | Slave / 2023

the gift

by Douglas Messerli

 

Shobha Nirvan (screenwriter and director) Slave / 2023 [37 minutes]

 

The loving couple of Indian director Shobha Nirvan’s 2023 film Slave, Adhyan and Avi, enter a “bungalow” in Goa, Adhyan being completely surprised by his lover having hidden the fact that he has such a place in which they can vacation.

 

     For a day or so they enjoy the ocean, make love, and luxuriate in the pleasure of the exotic locale. But it is now Adhyan’s birthday, Avi promising a surprise gift about which he is nervous whether his lover will accept. He blindfolds Adhyan and leads him downstairs to the present, where the startled Adhyan discovers a beautiful man standing before him, as Avi whispers into his ear: “This is your gift.”

      Adhyan is indignant, and immediately leaves, returning to his upstairs room. Avi tries to explain that it is simply his gift, but Adhyan argues that he must have gone mad, he has no intention of turning to have sex with someone else given his love of Avi. What he doesn’t quite realize is that it is a test, as Avi describes the delights of his present: “Is this something to ask? You are getting such a handsome and sexy boy as a gift and you are asking me what will you do with him?”

     Adhyan still doesn’t comprehend, demanding he send the boy away, but Avi arguing that he spent good money and promised to accept his gift. “But he is not a gift,” argues Avi.

    By morning, Adhyan discovers a note on his bedside table, Avi has gone away on business to Mumbai for two days, and that the “gift” is now in his shower. When the stranger attempts to seduce him, all Adhyan can reply is that Avinash “is so crazy.” The beautiful “gift” argues, he’s not crazy but is all his “for two days.”

     “So just leave,” the deserted lover insists. But the “gift” refuses since nothing has happened between them. But again, Adhyan insists that he leave, the stranger refusing since, he claims, he has principles, he does not take money without some results.

     Given no choice, Adhyan himself decides to leave.

    Sitting alone on the beach, he is finally greeted again by his “gift,” who walks towards him before moving off into the ocean before turning back to sit down next to the reluctant birthday boy.

    Don’t you find me sexy? the stranger asks, Adhyan replying, that since his relationship with Avi he has never felt so sexy himself.

    The stranger finally admits why Avi has hired him, the goal being to know whether after spending two days and two nights with another sexy guy he would still be able to love him. But in telling him that, of course, the seduction has begun.

    Adhyan returns to the bungalow, this time watching the sexy boy shower with deep longing. “But what do I do with this because I love Avinash, only Avinash.”

     According, the standoff continues.

     Adhyan invites the new roomer for a drink, almost as a truce.

     The “gift” finally asks Adhyan if he wasn’t in a relationship would he still leave him alone.

     The loyal lover still refuses to answer. But he soon asks the important question, “If anything happens between us tonight, will you still tell Avinash?”

       The prostitute’s answer is evasive, “What do you think?”

        But it seems suitable to the clearly lusting Adhyan, as the two soon kiss and spend the night in bed.

      Now, in this soap-opera, we discover what Adhyan parent’s lost everything, but that he too has a house in Goa, which he shows to his new friend, a place he had to buy back with his own hard-earned money. And soon we realize that the “gift” has fallen in love with Adhyan. And now it slowly comes out how Adhyan himself has felt all along with Avi.

 

     In Mumbai he was feeling lonely, with no job, no place to live. And then it met Avinash “at the bar and my life changed.” Nonetheless, he now admits, he never really maintained a true relationship with his lover, “I used to always depend on Avinash” because of his financial stability.  

Adhyan finally admits he feels he is a slave to Avi, a slave which he no longer wants to be.

       His new friend asks how long he remain in the situation, Adhyan responding that he will be so until he meet someone like him who might make a commitment. The two lovers walk late into the night, discovering as they return to Avi’s bungalow that he has suddenly returned.

       Avi is surprised to see the prostitute still there, but invites him to stay for one more night, the now quite confused “gift” not knowing how to respond: “It is very difficult for me to stay here.”

When Avi inquires what he means, the man declares he has another client meeting him in Goa. But Avi declares he will pay him one more night if he remains.

       He can only agree, but in so doing, of course, sets up the scene we have long expected.

       Avi is certain that Adhyan has done nothing with his lovely temptation because he loves him. But why the extra night, Adhyan wonders?

       Adhyan now feels all the inner terror he has long known lay before him. How to tell Avi, or should he tell Avi? How can he free himself from his sexual slavery?

       Suddenly Krish—the first time we hear his name—enters while Avi takes a shower, hugging Adhyan, and he now demands that his lover stop being afraid of Avinash and tell him the truth.

       Adhyan tells him the truth: he is not yet sure of Krish’s love.

       That evening, Avi taunts Krish, telling him that he heard he was a magician. “You have cast a spell with your sexiness.” Yet Avi wonders how that spell did not work on his own lover.

        Krish can only answer something to the effect of how he knows it spell has not worked?

       But Avi is sure of his control over Adhyan. “True love has power, Krish, in front of which every magic fades.”

        We know, of course, that Avi’s power is money, and money doesn’t win out over love.

     

      Avi finally demands a showdown, demanding Adhyan join them. He demands that Krish kiss Adhyan to prove his powers. As we know already, Krish pleas for Adhyam to love him have their effect, and Avi’s boyfriend quickly shows his true love of the interloper, Avi realizing he’s lost the bet.

        Avi insists that Adhyam has lost, but the outspoken ex-lover admits that he no longer wants to be Avi’s slave and has shared his bed and his heart with Krish.

        This Indian gay soap-opera (starring Akshat Talwar, Ayush Dubey, and Shawn Gupta, no roles listed) joins the many South American works of its kind as well as the numerous Asian boy-love stories that have become popular staples of weekly TV in their various countries, a genre, with the a few exceptions such as Queer As Folk, that has not yet found favor in the US and Europe.

 

Los Angeles, January 4, 2024

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (January 2024).