Zheng “Nathan” Nie | Submerged / 2018

no one around to save him

by Douglas Messerli

 

Zheng “Nathan” Nie (screenwriter and director) Submerged / 2018 [11 minutes]

 

Horace (Harrison Grant) has been in what he perceived as a gay relationship until a vaguely described accident involving being immersed in water, occurred. Evidently, his partner saved his life, but soon after begin to slip away from him, and finally stopped answering even his telephone calls.

    In response Horace as tried to involve himself in one-night stands through apps such as Grindr, but without much success. The most pleasant encounter was with Steve (Matthew Bunker), but neither he nor Steve made a call back, and now suddenly, after nearly three months, Horace has decided to call Steve up and make a date.

      Steve readily agrees to lunch, and the two meet up, agreeing that their previous shared encounter was memorable.

     Steve, who grew up in a small southern town, is, like Horace, seeking out a relationship, but now living in a large urban area he has, as he describes it, “learned the rules.” You meet up with someone and wait for a return call, which generally never comes, as Horace jokes. Who might have expected a call three months later?

     But Horace still has deep problems of commitment which is demonstrated by director Nie in his major hero’s continued fear of water. Although his building has a pool, he never visits it; and when Steve suggests that he might like to go for a swim, Horace sits on the sidelines.

    It is only when Steve, almost childishly, plays as if he’s drowning, pulling Horace into the water as he bends to help, that our hero recognizes the relationship. The water is shallow; he can indeed stand up in at least the far end of the pool; and he is not in danger of drowning.

     For the first time since his former lover has disappeared, Horace realizes that he can still be a swimmer in life, that he can seek out what he truly needs, a more stable relationship, which, as this short film comes to an end, he seems to have found in Steve.

     Clearly, there’s not new or profound here, and one wishes that writer/director Nie had more thoroughly explained what the “accident” from Horace was saved was all about. It appears he simply went into the water, got a cramp, and needed his companion’s help. But how did this become so easily associated with this lover’s leaving him soon after is not even explored, let alone explained. Perhaps he simply fears going into the water simply because there is no longer anyone around to save him. But this is only my hunch.

     In this short work, situations seem to be created around the needs of the plot, instead of the other way around, where narrative creates the situations.

 

Los Angeles, June 30, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (June 2025).