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 ...
A macho man Paulo is in an unhappy marriage with his wife and usually cycles around. One day after a serious argument with her, he gets lost while cycling and ends up in a forest like area known as the "Forest of whispers" a secret place where men meet for sexual purposes. Initially things around him, he finds it awkward. But he ends up finding himself drawn to a young twink blonde Luigi. Unhappy in his marriage, Paulo begins to frequent the forest often, and eventually gives into passion for Luigi's body. They connect every weekend in the forest and over the course of next few weeks and 6 months, they both find themselves falling in love for each other. Paulo finds his life drastically changing. Things will not be same again. Luigi, who was all about random sex finds himself thinking of Paulo and Paulo also finds out that his wife is now pregnant and decides to end their relationship. Luigi moves to US unable tuber this separation. Two years later they both reconnect when Paulo is now separated and happier being who he is and the return of his potential love bak in his life.
The whole premise was interesting but I found it somewhat cheesy and sex rom-com. For first 30 ish minutes we keep seeing just various people in the forest, their sexual encounters and pure flesh needs between Paulo and Luigi which soon gets boring. It's only when they both start to talk and get to know each other, proceedings become a little more interesting. But the whole sub plots of the wife cheating with the neighbor, who also happens to frequent the same forest for secret encounters was too much of a stretch. I did like how they showed Paulo and Luigi falling for each other and it grows over a period of time and is not random, but somehow something was missing. As audience I failed to connect with any character or felt empathy for them. As I mentioned, the acting is strictly ok and the whole premise could easily either should be short film or someone needs to write a much better screenplay. IMO , this was a wannabe 'Stranger by the lake', which, it does not even come close to. (4/10)
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