This is the second vertical AI BL drama I've sat through, and honestly I went in knowing better. I had it on while I was doing cardio at the gym, and what struck me was just how much the plot echoed the last one I watched. Same step brother romance angle, same mystery girlfriend showing up near the end, same extra guy pining after one of the leads. Genuinely the only thing going for it was the runtime, the whole thing wrapped up in forty five minutes flat. The setup kicks off with Finn moving schools because his mom just married into money. He finds out his new step brother Aiden goes to the same place, and he's warned to keep his distance from him. Their first run in at school is rocky, just like you'd expect, but there's this odd pull between them neither can shake off. Finn keeps telling himself not to read into it because Aiden's straight and openly homophobic. Things shift when some kids start bullying Finn and the student council president, Ryan, steps in to ...
Tana and Eros are a married couple. He runs a small street-front shop. She’s an opera singer struggling to stay engaged in her art. They have a good relationship. But unaware to Eros, Tana starts to frequent a gay bathhouse Copa 181. which starts to become his happy place. That's where we meet a few other characters primarily being transgender Kika who is falling in love with straight and married hustler Leo, who hustles in the gay sauna. We do see a couple of other characters whose scenes just come and go. eros harbors a dream of singing other kinds of songs as well and not just opera. When she eventually gets an opportunity to song at Copa 181, her husband's secret comes out. The film ends with them having a mature conversation around if they are happy or not.
The problem with this film is that it tries to do too much without putting enough focus on certain storylines for them to hold any emotional weight. Even though Eros and Tana are the main characters, we hardly get to know about their marriage and relationship. Why are they unhappy, why does Tana want to move to Japan, why does Eros' father not talk to her etc. Also we see a wee bit of Kika and Leo's character but it is never gone deeper which eventually frustrated me. Eventually, what we do get is how the inner workings of a gay sauna happen, how the make hormones rage inside, the hustling culture and how saunas serve as escape for many men. Visually the film is taught and nice but remains unfocused during the more tender moments between the characters. It just brushes on the surface. There was a lot of potential here from a story perspective which sadly was missed.
Nevertheless, this film is an empathetic tale about love, life, and relationships that doesn’t beat you over the head with any particular message. (5/10)
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