Houcem Slouli | Désir conditionnel (Conditional Desire) / 2023

riddle of desire

by Douglas Messerli

 

Houcem Slouli (screenwriter and director) Désir conditionnel (Conditional Desire) / 2023 [15 minutes]

 

What we don’t know at the beginning of Tunisian director Houcem Slouli’s short film of 2023 is gradually revealed without dialogue. Ahmed (Slim Dhib) and Salma (Imene Ghazouani), newly married, live in a life of seeming entrapment. They have almost regulatory sex, but sit with quiet impatience with one another most of the rest of the time.

     Salma’s life seems particularly defined by entrapment. Both characters are shown behind banisters which create bars, but Salma is particularly in a state of stasis, pots boiling over as she swallows chocolate bars and forlornly finger-spoons melted chocolate into her mouth, as if she were desperately trying to salve what she is missing in her life. At one point, the camera catches the decorative bars across a window while at the same moment portraying our heroine upside down in the mirror, hinting at both how her world has shifted her life and entrapped her simultaneously.

     There are no arguments. They have what might be described as dutiful sex before Ahmed rises and goes to the coffee-shop which he apparently owns and operates by himself.

      But gradually, we get glimpses of Ahmed in bed with a man, Cherif (Ghassen Trabelsi).

      Although the married couple sit calmly entrenched in the relationship in the house, their comings and goings on the staircase are noted, at one point, comically, their motions further entrapping each other as she forces him back toward their apartment while he pushes her to retreat back down the staircase.

   Their only conversation with each other consists of two central questions preceded by the statement: “The situation weighs on us.”

    Then, in a “face-off” in which they stare off in different directions:

              Salma: “Why did you say yes?”                   Ahmed: “Why didn’t you say no?”

       Soon after we see Salma with her own same-sex partner, Feriel (Aicha Azzouz) as two giggle together in bed.

       We perceive, in other words, that in the restricted society in which they live, both have chosen a marriage with the other to hide their own queer passions from others. But family has already interceded. Ahmed’s mother wants to know when she might expect them for dinner. Salma’s sister advises her that it is time for her to have a baby. And meanwhile, the very presence of the other puts restrictions of their sexual lives that they obviously did not previously experience.

       Slouli’s work never preaches, and, in fact, says absolutely nothing about their “other” desires and relationships, but in their empty stares, their own formulaic sex we sense their frustrations and impatience.

       Again, these are not exaggerated expressions. One might almost suggest that there is an almost Kabuki like aspect to Slouli’s work, the slightest gesture representing a world of significance making clear that although they have chosen the form of their imprisonment it is prison nonetheless.

       Whether they can maintain the charade, fitting the pieces of their passions into their relationship, or if they might actually grow to love one another as friends is not answered in Slouli’s riddle of how desire can become conditional.

       This film is a truly profound gem about a culture in which the personal sexual desires of individuals are so restricted that he chokes off nearly all joy and life. That these two have, at least, sought out some sort of compromise speaks to their bravery, given the suffering they still must endure.

 

Los Angeles, January 18, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (January 2025).

 

Krit Komkrichwarakool | Freefall / 2017

leaping into pity

by Douglas Messerli

 

Krit Komkrichwarakool (screenwriter and director) Freefall / 2017 [19 minutes]

 

I wanted to love this short film by Canadian director Krit Komkrichwarakool, particularly because of the gentle acting by both Chris McNally as Lucas—the lover and now full-time nurse of Ivan, suffering from ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, better known in US as Lou Gehrig’s Disease)—and Andrew Jenkins (playing Ivan). Both beautiful men have created an intense quiet drama that deserves the viewer’s attention.

 

   Yet the film is so surrounded by sentimental and, at moments, even kitsch images and devices that it’s hard to focus on the drama itself. First of all, both men are musicians, Lucas an amateur pianist who begins the film playing against the city skyline as busy workers hurry by, and Ivan, evidently a professional pianist who cannot resist joining Ivan that morning, the two of them creating a “beautiful ballad.” The resultant piece, which we later see Ivan—before the development of the disease—performing is described, at several points, as “a song written to his dream,” while “he put the dream into the song.”

     Mostly we see Lucas playing nurse to his lover. The major dramatic incident having happened long ago in the past, the night Ivan was first diagnosed in the hospital, when Lucas determined to finally leave him, unable to deal with what lay ahead (or, as he puts it, “I jumped.”) But obviously he returned, and Ivan is determined—now, after having lost most of his use of his legs, that he is even losing the use of his arms—to know why? Later, Lucas answers the question in the now quite traditional linguistic reversal in situations of love: “I didn’t stay because you needed me. I stayed because I need you.”

     But with all the pretty music, the repeated images of the lone piano player being joined by a partner, and the needy kisses of a man soon to die, this film, alas, is nearly all sentiment. If there are a few witty moments, a mockery of its own skydiving metaphors, they are simply too few such moments to escape the overwhelming sense that we should break out the tears and rend our garments in the desperate fear that is overcoming Ivan and the endless sacrifices made by Lucas.     

     Although Ivan is resentful about Lucas’ possible pity, the film itself wallows in it. And by the end of this short work we feel only pity, since we actually know so very little about the characters themselves.

     Besides playing early morning piano, what did Lucas actually do for a job? What did Ivan’s musical career consist of? Certainly, it cannot have had it its high with the little ditty by composers Samuel Kim and Blake Matthew. And what were our loveable fellows’ lives like before that fateful day by the lake? Did they have any friends? Why has Ivan fired all the other nurses? And what does he mean that they were “flirty”; did they hire only gay nurses? In short, who is this suffering man and his saintly nurse?

      Empathy is one thing, and I’m a born sentimentalist; but if I’m going to invest my tears in a movie I want to know why and what I’m blubbering about.

 

Los Angeles, January 18, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (January 2025).

Leland Montgomery | Hotter Up Close / 2022

a new sexual planet

by Douglas Messerli

 

Christopher Matias Aguila (screenplay), Leland Montgomery (director) Hotter Up Close / 2022

[16 minutes]

 

Skinny, with a slightly too ovoid face, Chris (Christopher Matias Aguila) is about to celebrate his 30th birthday, but is a bit at odds with the world since his boyfriend, Brad (John David Williams), not only broke up with him—and who had been sleeping with what Chris describes as “every animal in the 100 acre wood”— but was utterly dismissed by his former lover.

     His best friend and co-worker Dana (Liz Jenkins) insists he’ll find someone else. “What about that guy who comes into the shop?”

      “Aiden,” Chris nearly chokes on his drinking straw, “Are you insane. If I think Brad is out of my league, Aiden is, like, on a whole other, like sexual planet.”

      But at the moment it’s time for them to rush back to the coffee shop where they work as barristas.

     No sooner do they return to work, however, than the beautiful Aiden (Francisco San Martin) stops by, inviting them both to a pool party, causing Chris to nearly choke on the muffin his has just stuffed into his mouth.

      Chris quickly tries to squirm out of it invite, but Dana accepts for both of them, and even runs out to get a new pair of swimming trunks for her best friend.

      Although Chris has been listening to tapes in order to build up his self-confidence, one look at the stunningly bronzed muscled bodies in and around sends him into a tizzy. There is no way he might be able to fit in. Moreover, he lathers sunbathing lotion on his face that makes him look like a mime.

    Yet, Aiden does come out of the pool to greet the two, although a cutey in a yellow speedo, Marcus (Elijah Olachea) immediately calls him back into the pool to play whatever ball game they were engaged in.

      Chris leaves to pee, but immediately inside the house encounters her former boyfriend Brad, who’s just been fucking a highly effeminate individual named Indigo (Luke Millington-Drake), which makes things even worse. Yet, re-encountering his old flame does put some anger back into the generally spineless Chris, as he puts on his glasses and prepares to meet the world again—even if he knows it’s not his world.

     Fortunately, Leland Montgomery’s short film, with a script by the man who plays Chris, is a fantasy. And the moment Chris leaves the bathroom he runs into Aiden, who’s been looking for him. In fact, he wants a kiss.

      Chris is so stunned, he temporarily halts the kiss he’s dreamt of and demands an explanation, which Aiden gladly provides, explaining that he finds Chris funny, clever, and moreover, cute, and he is love with him. Chris asks one more question, this about Markus, in who Aiden quickly explains he’s not at all interested: “He’s real, real dumb.” And yes, they kiss, transporting the delighted lead actor into a new sexual planet.

       When Chris and Aiden exit the house, the whole party is singing happy birthday to him, Dana with cake in hand and the only straight man at the party (who Aiden declares has a large penis) breathing down her neck. How Aiden knows about his large penis is not explained, although Chris is clearly curious.

       There is absolutely nothing profound about Montgomery’s film, and nothing much to say about it. Except for his use of highly stereotypical figures, it’s what we used to describe as a sweet little flick with lots of pretty boys as a reward for watching it.

 

Los Angeles, January 17, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (January 2025).

 

Meredith Scott Lynn | Parental Guidance / 2008

the straight kids scold their queer elders

by Douglas Messerli

 

Meredith Scott Lynn (screenwriter and director) Parental Guidance / 2008 [4.40 minutes]

 

Ava (Rachel Nicole Hamilton) and Max (Ryan Ochoa), children, are sitting outside a cabin within which Ava’s two mothers and Max’s two fathers are all busy loudly arguing with each other. Why is never established.

     But Ava and Max are totally fed up and flee to the nearby lake. Max is the first to speak: “Ava, I know you’re hurting. And I can relate to your pain. But we can’t take untimely and dysfunctional communication personally.”

     So begins a conversation between the children that is a level far over their parents’ head, as they commit themselves, if it should ever come to be, to a relationship: “If our winding hearts lead us to one another’s paths in maturation, I will always try to stay mindful of your needs and encourage you to make them known to me.”

     Ava responds with something similar, but these are, after all, amateur child actors and their diction does not always fully translate to my older ears as they breathlessly rush through these long-winded lines.

     But we get the point. They are fully mature, while the parents are like children throwing tantrums.

    If director Meredith Scott Lynn had perhaps extended her one-line satire and created children that behaved closer to the characters in the novels of Ivy Compton-Burnett, in which the children always speak in more grammatically perfect sentences and in a much more intelligent way than the adults, Parental Guidance might have succeeded.

     But frankly, in this silly little piece, we cannot believe either the children nor the adults. Why should two lesbians and two gay men all be shouting at the top of their voices, and why should the

children commit to eternal understanding of one another. If their parents are really that hot-headed it is doubtful that these children would have come to these values or the language they are trying to hurry through. As it is, I might suggest these two obnoxiously correct little beings should enter the cabin and quiet down their maters and paters by simply reminding them there are kids in the house.

     But this little fantasy isn’t interested in a solution, just the obvious juxtaposition of responsible behavior. Sorry, I don’t believe it for a moment. And I was happy that everyone soon after was hurried off stage and back into their real lives.

     Finally, what was the point of this satiric exercise? To point out that even gay men and women lose their cool now and then? That two gay men and two lesbians in the same room generally results in chaos? That future straight children know best? That normalcy is better that being queer? Since its subject is not really about the gay couples it mentions only in passing, the film seems to be moving in the direction of queer baiting, 

 

Los Angeles, January 17, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (January 2025).

Alexander Roman | Lonely in Seattle / 2021

a good masseur is hard to find

by Douglas Messerli

 

Alexander Roman (screenwriter and director) Lonely in Seattle / 2021 [51 minutes]

 

If you’re studying massage therapy, into New Age and Buddhist Studies, and fascinated with “Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response” (ASMR) (an accompanying score that produces pulsing, pleasurable tingling, so the film’s introductory credits report) Alexander Roman’s Lonely in Seattle is the movie for you. Moreover, there’s lots of pretty pictures of Seattle and nature in general along with the rest of the stuff.

     Never before have I seen a movie of 51 minutes spend almost half of its time demonstrating the techniques of massage. But that’s the point, I gather, of this cinematic effort, to get you into a cozy position, show you pretty pictures, and present a rather banal portrait of a man who has it all—money, brains, and chiseled good looks—who realizes that what he really wants in his bed is not simply a fuck-buddy, but a man who will hang in there, cuddle, and stroke your neck after a long day of buying up new property.

    That man, Luke (Matt Ford) spends most of his time, since this after all is Seattle, in a chic, dark coffee shop—probably one which his own company built—meeting up with his equally capable and busy chatterbox of an assistant, Beth (Christina Ros), she reporting on the newest local zoning meeting she attended, he worried about the fact that he hasn’t yet heard about the offer he’s made on a property.

      She’s a lesbian, he a gay man; but unlike Beth who has a date that night, Luke is hands off, disgusted and discouraged by all the boys who would line up to go bed with him each night, but leave him early the next morning.

      Poor little rich kid. In his spare time, he visits a kind of Buddhist-like psychologist, who attempts to probe into the reasons—gently, carefully, and only with permission—why he finds it difficult to commit himself to others. If there’s a secret, other than he’s tired of one-night stands, we never discover it.

     Beth, who seems to know best what her boss needs, arranges, despite his busy schedule, for him to have a massage by a new guy in town, straight out of Brooklyn, Wes (Alexander Roman), a chunky, backpack carrying guy without even a massage table. He treats Luke this first time just by massaging his hands.

       For Luke, it’s love upon first massage. And soon after he has invited Wes over to the lovely little cottage he has built for himself for a full back and stomach massage, to which we are privy along with the pictures of leaves, lights, and raindrops I hinted at above. Luke is even willing to pay Wes to stay a while longer simply to cuddle.

     Soon enough, Luke is feeling deeply for the masseur, but the therapist himself needs a shrink. He has such a poor self-image that he simply cannot imagine why a handsome, sleek, bearded gay millionaire might possibly be interested in such a slumpy simpleton as he imagines himself to be. Luke assures him that he’s simply lonely, and that what Wes offers can’t be matched all the cute gay boys in the Emerald City.

      The two crawl into bed together and are never seen again. The end.

 

Los Angeles, January 17, 2025

Reprinted from My Queer Cinema blog (January 2025).