Lasse Nielsen | Fødselsdagen (Happy Birthday) / 2013

getting what he wanted

by Douglas Messerli

 

Lasse Nielsen and Bent Petersen (screenplay), Lasse Nielsen (director) Fødselsdagen (Happy Birthday) / 2013 [24 minutes]

 

Danish cineaste Lasse Nielsen’s 2013 Happy Birthday is, like Birthday Time a comedy also concerning a boy soon to come into the age of legal sexual consent, in this case a 14-year-old Thomas (Mathias Hartmann Nicalsen) about to turn 15, which, as I previously mentioned, is the age of consent in Denmark. But as I observed above, like Olav he is highly impatient for the magic event, particularly since he is sexually excited by his hunky next-door neighbor (Jos Gylling), whom he often observes lounging shirtless in the neighboring yard.

      Fully recognizing that he is gay, Thomas has just signed up for the website “Boyfriend” where, stating that he is 18 seeking an older male friend, he hooks up with a user named Gentle Man who mentions that he is soon to have his 35th birthday party. With youthful anticipation, Thomas writes back “Am I invited?” with the Gentle Man suggesting that perhaps they should first meet.

       The next day they make an appointment to meet up at the “Ruins,” evidently a gay gathering spot in a nearby park. Thomas bicycles up to the designated location only to find his handsome neighbor waiting on a bench. Recognized, in turn, by the neighbor who asks him what he’s doing in such a spot, the boy responds that he’s looking for his dog. When he turns the question back upon his neighbor, the man reports that he is waiting for someone.

      With hardly a pause, Thomas sits down beside him, gradually moving closer and closer until his hand is touching the other man’s knee, who stands the instant of contact, suggesting that the kid should be getting along home to see if his dog might have returned, in response to which Thomas resolutely gets on his bicycle and moves off, frustrated that the secret “meeting” has not ended the way he hoped it might. 

     He dares not answer the next communication from the Gentle Man, but noticing the next day that his neighbor is driving away, he illegally enters the man’s house, checking out his large library, noticing in the hall a photograph of his neighbor with his arm around another man—whom we now come to realize was his former companion, who died we can only presume of AIDS—before he comes upon the dinner table nicely set for a small party where he sits down, pretends to pour himself a drink, and toasts birthday greetings to his imaginary friend, before entering the man’s bedroom, lifting up a pair of shorts, sniffing them, and tucking under his own shirt. For the boy it is like an imaginary fairyland which he may someday—in his mind far too long in the future—be able to experience love.

 

   Back on the “Boyfriend” sight, Thomas again queries whether his friend is home; he responds that he is, but is not writing to him because he has lied about his age. The boy apologizes but notes that we will soon be 15, but the Gentle Man immediately cuts off further communications. He might be arrested, we can imagine, even if he was seen to have been encouraging the underaged boy to engage in a relationship.

     Thomas tries again: “Can’t we just be friends?” And after a few moments his neighbor writes back: “All right. Friends.” Thomas slyly smiles.

      In the very next scene, we see Thomas with his bicycle in his own backyard, his beloved neighbor calling to him over the fence. The boy’s mother has evidently told him that Thomas’ birthday is on Saturday, the boy responding, “my mother will be away so I’m not having a party.” The friend suggests he come to his place in party dress, maybe a tie. 8:00. You can almost feel the boy’s racing heart as a large grin transforms his face, he uttering the Danish word for thanks, “Tak.”

      We see Thomas after his shower singing joyfully before putting on a white shirt, a cute hat, and in his imagination a tie properly knotted as he knocks upon the neighbor’s door, and a second later with a tie properly knotted against a naked chest. He actually shows up with a tie whose knot he could not complete. The neighbor gracefully greets him and ties it for him, the boy basking in in touch of the hands attending his neck.

      Thomas is invited to sit where he did all alone so many days earlier, and this time he toasts with a glass actually filled with wine to his neighbor’s birthday greetings. A gift waits next to his plate. The man thanks him for coming, and the boy thanks him for the invitation. There’s no need to show anything further. No sex necessary in this instance. The boy has come of age and whatever now happens, he is ready. And what is in that box also doesn’t matter, for this boy has gotten everything he wanted.

 

Los Angeles, May 23, 2021

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (May 2021).