Joel Junior | Ice Cream and Tequila / 2018

 hold the tequila please

by Douglas Messerli

 

Joel Junior (screenwriter and director) Ice Cream and Tequila / 2018 [11.40 minutes]

 

Frankly you can leave me out of this “Postcoital dysphoric” short film, that defines its major character, Jonathan, as feeling “sadness, anxiety, agitation or aggression after consensual sexual intercourse.” 

    Immediately after what seems to be a totally fulfilling sexual experience, Jonathan (Jeremy Sless) declaims that the marvel of life is “That their minds can mix two different domains, ‘art sex, space, causality and friendship, creating new laws, social relationships, and technologies.’”

    He then proceeds to again sexually entice his previous sexual partner only to proclaim: “I want it and by body wants it, but I can control it, and I don’t need it. That’s my point.”

    At this instant, I believe, I would have quickly pulled on my clothes (precisely what Cody [Justin Powell] is trying to accomplish) and left the room.

    But this short film cannot escape it’s determined subject: “The post-sex blues.”

    Cody suggest the solution: “Ice cream and tequila,” but our supposed hero—not someone, fortunately, I ever encountered—Jonathan cannot even imagine attempting the remedy before his quite beautiful and successful lover has left the room.

    All of this, I should mention, is played out in such a dark, murky color that we can barely glimpse the beautiful boys who have just engaged in this sexual act which has resulted in such a truly ridiculous response. 

    Goodbye. I’ll be off to seek someone who truly enjoys the sexual act, not just as it happens but after it as well. A Postcoital dysphoric is not someone with whom you want to stay around to hear about his afterthoughts and complaints, and this movie doesn’t even allow you to see his lovely butt.

    I know such people exist. A good friend once complained of his feelings of depression after having sex. But as someone who enjoys the long, languorous afterthoughts of sexual encounters, I turned away from the conversation as quickly as Cody slinks out the door of his pretty boy’s fuck. At least Jonathan tries the remedy, although I have to be honest, I don’t truly like Tequila.

 

Los Angeles, February 4, 2025 | Reprinted from My Queer Cinema (February 2025).