Julio Dowansingh | Family Affair / 2023

a dad and son act

by Douglas Messerli

 

Ernest Anemone (screenplay), Julio Dowansingh (director) Family Affair / 2023 [16 minutes]

 

The truly delightful short comedy Family Affair begins by seeming to be about anything but what its title hints.

    High school senior Tanner (Bear D’Angelo), an intelligent student is told by his mother, Beverly (Donna Vivino) that he not only needs to stop jerking off, but that his douchebag friend, an effeminate black man, is waiting in the kitchen, and that if Tanner does not immediately come down to claim him, she might murder Tanner in his “fucking sleep.” After all, the friend is explaining why is trying to convince Beverly that it’s not her “fault” for being single. “Men are socialized to fear a strong, aggressive woman.”

     Did I forget to mention that Tanner is a transgender male? He saves the day by offering his mother a celebratory Mother’s day gift, one day late, which, so Beverly declares will permit him “to keep him living a little longer.”

     Beverly, we soon discover, is evidently working as an on-line sex worker.

    Just as in John Waters’ 1998 film Pecker, the typical US family is revealed to be something a bit different from what many might imagine it to be.

     Meanwhile, I should mention, Tanner has been communicating via his cellphone with someone who sounds like a possible sexual date, who given both of their comments sounds quite sinister. “Are we still doing this?” “Yes. Stop asking.”

     We have clearly entered a world where asking is beside the point.

     In Tanner’s classroom, his black friend Emily (Morgen McKynzie) is worried about Tanner’s recent decision, while addressing the only black make in the room, an apparent gay boy, as Simon and later Calvin (his is name, he [Emmet Smith] repeats is Kevin, proving white cis boys are not truly important in this world.)

      Emily warns Tanner than Beverly will murder her when she finds out, with Tanner responding that his mother has been threateningly to kill him for the last 18 years, which, if nothing else, makes it clear than at least Tanner is of age. Maybe their course in body science (in which the students have chosen to name their resident skeleton as “Boner”) is actually a college classroom, even if the film’s publicists insist they are high school students.

     Back on the cellphone, her correspondent is asking “Have you told your friends about us?” Tanner answers, “Yeah,” her phone friend presuming that “it’s a bad idea.” Asking if he’s told his mom, Tanner replies “That would definitely complete her mental breakdown.” Who is this cellphonic pervert we can only wonder?

     Tanner encounters his fellow jock Mike to who she explains that she cannot show up to practice, his mother being slightly (perhaps enormously) incontinent, while also helping the poor gay boy with his spilled backpack dioramic of imaginary figures. In most gay films Mike might have been Tanner’s secret heartthrob. But then, this is not your standard US High coming out film either. Kevin doesn’t even matter in this world of  “other” concerns.

     Tanner finally meets up at the office, inside of the predesignated parking lot, of the man with whom he has been communication. “Look, I’m starting to think is a big mistake,” says what appears to be a doctor, a psychologist, or just a straight businessman. I can vote, I can serve in the military, observes Tanner. “This isn’t just about you’re your age, the handsome stranger observes.

“Look, I done living my life for other people,” Tanner finishes off the conversation.

      As Tanner begins to unpack his bag, the stranger insists, “Not here. We’ll go to my place.”

      In his bedroom we hear words, with no appearances of the figures behind them: “Ow, that hurts.” “I’m doing my best,” just before the camera reveals the two in sequined gowns, and in flaming red mock wigs. “How do I look?” Tanner asks her father, who replies, “As beautiful as the day you were born.”

      We suddenly realize that in Jamaican-born Julio Dowanisngh’s film, they are about to share the stage in drag.

      All fury, Beverly shows up, opposed to the whole notion of her “son” appearing with her drag- performer husband, but also realizing that it’s hopeless. But when the mother finally explains she’s just there to support her “son,” Tanner and his father Tommy (Dan Domingues) take to the stage to do what we all know will be an incomparable act.

     The film ends with Tommy responding to Beverly’s act of love, “You know, Bev, you’re the only woman I would have ever married,” she responding, “Ditto,” closes this totally queer deconstruction of US notions of gender and sexuality.

     By the time we finish this short work, we thankfully exit the theater dizzily wondering what gender and sexuality is all about.

 

Los Angeles, October 20, 2024

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema (October 2024).