STREAMING: YOUR NAME ENGRAVED HEREIN.
YOUR NAME ENGRAVED HEREIN (Netflix) Despite the clumsy translation of the title (The Name Engraved In Your Heart would be more accurate), it’s enlightening to see the experience of being gay in another culture.
It’s Taiwan, 1987, and 38 years of martial law has just been lifted. The formerly repressed nation has to re-learn how to speak openly without fear. It will be a while before gays emerge from the shadows, so any steps in that direction involves huge courage.
Teenager Bo-De is a fan of American movies and is nicknamed Birdy, after Alan Parker’s film about two Vietnam vets, “one normal and one crazy”, the crazy one obsessing with being a bird – an obvious symbol.
Bo-De and best mate Jia-han are inseparable at school. They can barely admit their love to themselves, let alone each other, but others see it and they’re victimised. (“Beat him or he’ll force us all to be gay!”)
Making it harder, the boys attend a military school with a strong religious tradition. Birdy demands answers of the school priest, wanting to know why he seeks love from his friend but does not find it; he knocks but the door is not opened, he asks but does not receive.
A Bible verse at the film’s start drives Birdy’s quest for love and spiritual truth: “Many waters cannot quench love, nor can rivers drown it. If a man tried to buy love with all his wealth, his offer would be utterly scorned.” (Song Of Solomon, 8:7)
Occasionally the acting lapses into hysteria, lines are shouted unnecessarily, and the constant use of Danny Boy is incongruous, as are the scenes at Niagara Falls at the end. The characters are, however, tenderly drawn. The shower scene at school as Birdy washes Jia-hans bruises is particularly erotic.
The story is very moving: it follows the boys at high school, revisits them at a 17-year school reunion, and again 30 years after school. Birdy and Jia-han may not have been able to fully admit their love but times are changing, the country is changing and, importantly, the two men are changing. The movie ends on a gentle and uplifting note that will have you in tears.
Marriage equality was proposed in Taiwan 16 years after martial law ended; it was another 16 years before it was passed. (114 mins, rated M)
THOMAS BANKS’ QUEST FOR LOVE (Stan)
Thomas Banks is a young Australian gay man with cerebral palsy. Defying his limitations, he put together a one-man show about his journey to find love and this short-form doco is the account of that fiveyear experience.
He does all the things other gay guys do – loves the sauna, struggles on Grindr, tries to pick up guys. He has a great sense of humour. In one scene he hides lube in his bag just so his female PA will find it.
He does find love, with Blair, and life is euphoric for a time. Until Blair takes his things and leaves. “I’ve been hurt so many times before,” Thomas says to camera.
Despite his difficulties, which includes unclear speech (an actor provides voiceover for some of it) and uncoordinated movement, it’s very clear that what Thomas wants most of all is to be accepted “for all I am”.
The biggest lesson is that “love comes when you’re not looking, when you’re really happy with who you are”.
The final frame will have you cheering: “This is me. I am a gay guy with a disability.” A win for inclusivity. (31 mins, rated PG)
TOY BOY (Netflix) This bingeworthy Spanish series, shot in picturesque Marbella, has enough eye candy and fluffy plot to engage through to the end.
Gorgeous stripper Hugo (Jesús Mosquera) wakes up on a party boat one morning next to a burnt corpse and finds himself doing 15 years for murder. After seven years, hot-shot young lawyer Triana (played to perfection by María Pedraza) defies her boss and pursues the real killer, getting Hugo released for a retrial.
He promptly returns to the only job he’s qualified for – stripping – and re-teams with his old stripper buddies. Thankfully, much of the plot revolves around their rehearsals and performances.
The acting is inconsistent but who cares? The strippers are all great at what they do, even if it’s not acting. Veteran Spanish actress Cristina Castaño is excellent as local powerbroker Macarena Medina de Solís, whose husband was the victim on the boat. Her teenage son, with inexplicably green hair, may have been raped years ago and he’s now the love interest of one of the strippers.
The show attracted little attention until it was picked up by Netflix where it has been a huge success, possibly buoyed by another Spanish superhit, House Of Paper.
We can’t wait for series two, which has just been announced with the return of the same cast.
(13 episodes, rated M)
FUNNY BOY (Netflix)
“A boy cannot dress up as a bride!”
In Sri Lanka in the 1970s, young Arjie is constantly taunted for his “odd habits”.
Parallel to his inner turmoil is the political upheaval of the time as the upper-class Tamils struggle as a minority group in the largely Sinhalese country. But all eight-year-old Arjie wants to know is why the adults call him “funny” and why it’s such a bad thing.
With unexpected allies in his extended family and an intoxicating belief in himself, he manages to emerge from childhood and adolescence as a proud gay young man, if somewhat falteringly.
Finally, 17-year-old Arjie (played by openly gay Brandon Ingram) and his family flee to Canada where he’s free to embrace being gay… only to be confronted with overt and ugly racism against people of colour. (109 mins, rated MA15+)