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 ...
Starting with the legalization of gay sex in private for adults over 21 years old this film moves quickly through the history of male homosexuality in the UK. It talks about how there were no places for gay men to meet, then slowly moving onto a few books and magazines that started to get published where male genitalia would be on display, helping gay men to move away from Playgirl magazines. It then talks about how slowly some open gay bars opened up and how men would meet at these clubs and bars and other various cruising spots to gratify themselves. It also talks about the first gay pride parade and how that was one of the first major events. Of course, the fears of AIDS crisis slowed things down causing fear among the gay community but eventually everyone bounced back. The fight for legal age of consent for gay marriage, legalization of gay weddings, to the first gay characters in sitcoms eventually leading to full blown shows like Queer As Folk, right through to the modern events of gaydar.com.
This was not going to be a soft documentary. With a subject like this, expect to see a lot of naked Mae images on screen and I like it for that. The documentary just doesn't show the multiple interviewees but the makers try to keep it interesting by having multiple video and static clippings of almost all events being talked out here, which keeps the proceedings very interesting. Like any potted history of any subject, the film struggles to have a lot of debate or detail and it is fair to suggest that this is a weakness of the documentary – that it rattles forward covering ground without perhaps having a lot of food for thought, but it is hard to criticize it for this because this is also a strength. We all all of the history by now, or at least I hope most of us know, but it still is an interestingly plotted timeline across the history of male homosexuality across the years in UK. With a duration of about 50 minutes, it does make for an engaging watch. (6/10)
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