Four queer short film are meeting their exes
What happens when a relationship ends? Where does that history – that shared experience, those emotions and desires and dreams – go? And what happens when, after some time, you are confronted by that relationship again, whether you have moved on from it or not?
This week’s short films are about exes re-encountering each other in a variety of circumstances, trying – and sometimes succeeding – to resolve their unfinished business.
“I’m here for a reason, of course. I want to take back what’s mine.”
I have to start this recommendation with a caveat: 幸福選擇題五部曲 – 孤鳥還鄉 | 5 Lessons in Happiness: Homebound, directed by Adiamond Lee, is not a complete story, and ends somewhat abruptly. It appears to have been part of a series of several short films that were pitches to see if they could be extended into longer movies or series. Evidently this one didn’t succeed, though fortunately this version is a Director’s Cut that adds a little more than the original short.
That said, I found the film very compelling despite its ambiguous ending. Feng Li Hua (Ding Ning), the manager of a drag show in Japan, returns home to Taiwan after 35 years when her father passes away. She’s immediately embroiled in family fights with her brothers over property, but her main interest seems to be in reuniting with her widowed sister-in-law Xiu Yun (Yang Li Yin).
Li Hua’s arrival is set with a backdrop of the politics of the Taiwanese LGBTQ community’s movement to legalize same-sex marriage and the opposition they faced. Li Hua is very much grounded in queer culture, while she returns to a world where she was previously stifled enough to leave. That contrast in life experience between her and Xiu Yun may make it hard for them to pick up where they left off, but much of that will have to be left to the imagination of each viewer.
幸福選擇題五部曲 – 孤鳥還鄉 | 5 Lessons in Happiness: Homebound
“So you think I’ll just write poems, you’ll play the guitar, and we will live happily ever after?”
Dhruv & Jai, written and directed by Aayush Sharma, begins with Dhruv (Hasit Shah) returning home to India after years studying in London. His first stop is the home of his ex-boyfriend Jai (Dishank Joshi). Jai’s mother lets him in while Jai is on his way back from work, and as Dhruv waits in his room, he reflects on their relationship and the way they left things before his departure.
This is a sweet, realistic look at the ways love and relationships can be interrupted by other life circumstances. There’s a sense throughout that no matter how much Dhruv and Jai loved each other when they were dating, they had different ideas about how their relationship should proceed, including what Jai thought Dhruv should be prioritizing in his career. The question is whether, after years apart, they can find their way back onto the same page.
Dhruv & Jai
“To be close to love, to never let it touch, to be scheming on the surface of the mind.”
Since I’m not well-versed in either experimental film or dance film, it sometimes takes me a couple rewatches of those types of shorts to feel their full impact. Not so with Close to Love, written and directed by Daisy Zhou, which stunned me from the moment it began. A bride (Kibrea Carmichael) is on the run, making way through city streets in a full wedding gown, interrupted by groomsmen who try to get in the way. But eventually the bride makes it to the apartment of the bride’s ex-lover (Chloe Freeman), where the two of them express their regret, anger, and sorrow through movement.
The score by Dream City works perfectly with the choreography by Amy Gardner, opening with percussive and sometimes discordant music that is matched by the staccato motions of the bride, both of which smoothen out when the formers lovers are united, although the mood is no less tense and dramatic. Costuming and make-up are key as well, particularly with the very gendered contrasts between the bride and the groomsmen initially, which are then subverted to allow the two ex-lovers to be in suits as well. It’s all powerful and captivating, and even if it hit me from my first watch, it’s still worth revisiting many times anyway.
Close to Love
“The consultation time is over.”
봄에는 사랑이 올까요? | Hello? Spring is Coming, directed by Hanbyeol Jeong, introduces us to a woman named Bom (Yoon Sang Yi), meaning “spring”, who goes to her ex-girlfriend (Dam Choi) for a tarot reading to see if they should get back together. During the reading, the tensions of their relationship are revisited and resolved. This cute short is fairly straightforward and brief, but it gives us the happy ending we hope for when watching exes who still seem so right for each other.
봄에는 사랑이 올까요? | Hello? Spring is Coming
