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Contrast (Japanese Series)

By Golu
This is basically a high school BL where two guys who have nothing going on in common somehow end up getting really close to each other, and that's kind of the whole point of the title too. There's barely any drama or fluff packed in here, it stays pretty straightforward the whole way through. A little bit of friction pops up here and there, but it's nothing compared to what you'd normally get in this kind of show. Runtime wise you're looking at 8 episodes, each one sitting around 25-30 minutes. The two guys carrying the story are Akira and Kanata, and funny enough they knew each other's faces way before they ever knew each other's names. Kanata's the type everyone likes, always got people around him, popular guy, but there's this distance to him that people can't quite place. Turns out he had an injury that ended his football days, and that's what pushed him into being more withdrawn, and it only got worse once his younger brother got picked...
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La sirène à barbe (French) [The Bearded Mermaid]

By Golu
I am not sure I fully understood what this film was about. I mean, yes, I get that it was a story about a group of drag queen performers and their life, but I was quite confused between so many characters and what was the film actually trying to show. The plot tracks drag queens of The Bearded Mermaid cabaret, who put on a riveting show featuring singing, circus, and dancing—something never seen before in the small town of Dieppe in France.

One night, a lonely fisherman stumbles into “The Bearded Mermaid,” a faded little cabaret that turns out to be anything but ordinary. He steps into a world of laughter, glitter and love that he totally embraces, opening up to these characters as joyful as they are morose. Run by a fiercely committed trio of drag performers - firecracker Sweety, anxious stage manager Beluga who is also the 'mother' of them all, and gentle aerialist Alonso - the cabaret is struggling to keep its doors open. Their dream? A glitter-filled, lip-sync-and-circus spectacle that will put them on the tourist map. The fisherman then ventures into their world of joy and celebration and discovers, behind the costumes of the stage characters, tormented humans, lonely, too sensitive but ready to do anything to take this project as far as possible. At some point this fisherman starts to have an affair with one of the drag performers and they make a couple.  The 'mother' has her own issues going on and the third drag queen also keeps going from one place to another with her bags. I was quite confused at one point what's going on. Anyway, eventually the group gets an opportunity ti perform in a club in Brighton, UK and they all have a gala time. Relationship will be tested when new boys in the new town will come into the mix. The film ends also quite abruptly as it started.

The film has a lot of musical numbers and honestly they are all pretty darn good. The music, singing and the performance - all of it. The actors felt amateur somehow and I wonder if they are real life drag queens! Corny one-liners and awkward line deliveries are balanced by moments of real vulnerability and backstage camaraderie. So, even though the film feels its meandering all over the place with no clear direction on where it wants to head, it still had some charm to it. The pace is quite uneven at time and I was struggling to keep a track of who the person was between the drag version and their natural version , especially between the two main drag performers. Also, I didnt understand how come Sweety suddenly falls for the young fisherman guy? One moment she rejects him saying he is too young and that she has a man at home and then she is all over him. It was decent, entertaining in Ana amateurish sort of way but also very confusing from a story and logic point of view. (4/10)
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