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Aniki and Me 3: Switched Hearts (Japanese)

By Golu
If you've been following along with these Japanese Pink films, you already know the deal. An hour of simulated gay sex, a little story baked in, and a premise that's completely ridiculous but somehow keeps you watching. This one goes all in on the body swap fantasy, basically asking the question, what if you woke up one day inside your hot friend's body and could finally act out everything you've been keeping to yourself? Atsushi is gay and has been quietly carrying a crush on his childhood friend Yuma for years. They fell out of touch but end up back in each other's lives when they wind up at the same company. Yuma is straight and has a girlfriend, though things between them aren't exactly great. Then one day, after some kind of signing strike, the two men swap bodies, and suddenly Yuma is walking around in Atsushi's skin and Atsushi is living inside the guy he's been fantasizing about forever. Atsushi wastes zero time taking full advantage, fooling aro...
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My Dear (Chinese/English/Hungarian) (Documentary)

By Golu
My Dear is a self-reflective documentary about the will of a young Chinese director Yao to express his own sexual identity in Europe. Shifting between observational footage, paper puppetry, and poetic symbolism, he explores expressions of sexual identity in this essay about queerness, immigration, and performance. (A question I have is, since Yao was living in Budapest, why is the country of origin shown as Portugal?)

Yao, a Chinese national, is nearing the end of his two year European college education.  Yet the 26-year-old is reluctant to return to China because he is already being pressured by his parents to come back home, get married and have kids. This closeted gay man has been in a relationship with Asim, a gay Iranian living in China for almost 6 years now, but no one in China knows this. He thought that coming to Europe would liberate him but now that he is finishing studies and finding a job is becoming increasingly hard, choices for him are minimal. He realizes that maybe one performance as a drag artist will make him feel free and liberate him before he may have to eventually move back to China. 

With just an hour duration, thankfully it was not too long but it just felt incomplete. Most of us have our own coming out stories but there has to be something very compelling and unique to make a film out of it, something that people would wanna watch. Is being together with the one you love worth abandoning the culture that defines who you are?  Is swallowing the dictates of the culture you were brought up in worth betraying and repressing your true nature?  This film offers no resolution of these questions. Yes, using puppetry and imagery to show us the conversations with his family is unique, but the story overall holds no attention. Why is Yao interested in drag? What is the boyfriend's back story? I would have liked to see some of that. Also the ending felt rather abrupt. The whole build up towards Yao trying to find a mentor to perform should have ideally culminated with the actual performance. But we never get to see that. I mean we don't even get to know what really happens to him or his boyfriend. The title of this documentary comes form the song that Yao is preparing to perform on, but honestly overall this documentary is something which doesn't really offer anything new or unique and I wouldn't consider it an essential viewing. (4/10)
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