Alexis Van Stratum | Fast Forward / 2004

a young man standing at the edge of a dance floor

by Douglas Messerli

 

Alexis Van Stratum (screenwriter and director) Fast Forward / 2004 [5 minutes]

 

Dutch director Alexis Van Stratum’s fast forward is what you might describe as a short film centered around a gimmick, and not particularly, in this case, an original one.

    A young shy teen (Geert Hunaerts) moves to the dance floor of a gay nightclub, swaying slightly with the music and clearly ready to join in if he can only find the right partner. He spots a cute boy (Nicolas Gilson) who stares back at him; but a moment or two later the youth’s boyfriend returns with a drink. The shy teen is obviously disappointed.

     Soon after the teen has transformed into a slightly older man (Matteo Simoni), but still attractive, who spots another cute boy on the floor. This time he does meet up with the boy and they speak, drowned out by the music, but obviously asking if he’d like a drink.

      In the moment or two he in which it takes for the bartender to bring him the drinks, we discover upon our hero’s (Bejamin Ramon) turning around that he has grown a mustache, having grown a little older. And when he returns to the someone older and perhaps wiser youth, the twink pulls away from his embracement.

     Shortly after, our shy teen has grown into an old man (Koen Onghena), sitting it out at a club booth, again with a young boy to whom he gives a large bill before he leaves the table.

     A few minutes later, a still older version of the original teen (Alain Von Goethem) stands swaying just like his youthful self, but suddenly is stricken by a heart attack and falls to the floor, presumably dead.

     Yes, time does move almost that fast, and all those years our cute teenager has somehow sadly never found someone to love. Perhaps if he simply got out of that bar or sought out more age- appropriate mates. One muses over the other possibilities.

     As one commentator with the moniker of CinemaSerf hints, it is difficult to point to this short film’s message, if it has one. There seems almost to be a whiff of homophobia here in the film’s suggestion of “the shallowness or fickleness of gay existence.” Surely, we don’t need another reiteration of carpe diem.

     I’ve done a lot of embarrassing things in my fairly long life, but I’m sure I’ll never fall dead on the floor of a gay nightclub. Unlike the old geyser in this film, I’m far too self-conscious about how silly I might look standing at the edge of a dance floor; but then I’m sure the young shy teen was just as self-conscious, which is perhaps why he did not enter into the fray of a fuller life.

 

Los Angeles, August 2, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (August 2025).