Florent Médina | Eva / 2016

a transformation

by Douglas Messerli

 

Florent Médina (screenwriter and director) Eva / 2016 [10 minutes]

A seemingly shy boy, Gabriel (Eddy Wonka) for reasons unexplained has come to have sex with transgender prostitute Eva (Emanuele Arioli). With a record in the background, they briefly “tango” their way to the bed as she undresses him, he bending to kiss her. But when it comes time to insert his penis he apparently cannot get an erection, and sits up, she also rising in frustration, insisting that it’s no big deal. A lot of boys like him don’t know what they really want.

    She’s convinced it’s her penis that has put him off, but Gabriel attempts to reassure her that isn’t the reason, even though he cannot explain his own emotions or sexual attractions.

   But when he spots her artificial breasts, he becomes fascinated, she explaining how to put them on, and finally, pasting them on him. Still fascinated by her makeup and appearance, she recognizes that he would like to put on a dress, and helps his chose one, putting some eyeliner on as well.

    It is clearly time to leave, he explains and goes to pay her. But when he takes out his billfold, she spots a picture, which she asks it see. It’s his mother. And immediately she claims that he knows what will make it perfect, as she pulls out a dark black wig, so different from her own red curly wig, and places it on his head. In some respects, he has become his mother, who we sense he obviously had a close attachment.

     He insists, however, that he must go, and attempts again to pay her. But she asks if she might have the photograph instead.

     This evocative short by French director Médina gives evidence of a young man desiring sex who has chosen the transgender prostitute not because he is sexually drawn to her, but because he is drawn to the gender into which Eva has transformed herself. Surely, he too is fascinated by that transformation and we can only imagine that in the future he will also try to discover himself sexually through just such a dress, wig, and makeup.

     Eva realizes, surely, that she has satisfied this angel far more fully than if he had shot his wad of cum into her ass.

 

Los Angeles, May 5, 2024

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (May 2024).