Skip to main content

300 Cartas (Spanish) [300 Letters]

How can two people spend an entire year together and feel completely different about the situation? One things everything is great, while the other one has a whole different perspective. This is what the film is trying to explore. Over the course of the film we see many glimpses of this couple's relationship right from living together to threesomes to arguments, the entire relationship plays out. Is the viewer supposed to decide who’s right and who’s wrong?

Tom and Jero are a gay couple who have become well-known on Instagram. On what would be their first anniversary, Jero comes home to find that Tom has left him. The only item left behind is a pink box with 300 letters that Tom wrote on each day they were together. The letters seek to explain why their relationship reached the conclusion it did, and as Jero works his way through them, he realizes that the relationship was nothing like he thought it was. Flashbacks take us to the early days of their relationship. We don’t really see Tom writing the letters in the past but he does seem to document the ups and downs of that year. The early days of Jero and Tom’s relationship is dominated by sex. They meet up initially for a one-time hook-up that turns into something more. They both agree that normally they both won't go for the sort of the person that the other guy is (Jero is chiseled and what one would call muscle gay while Tom is more of a fem gay). With each letter, Jero feels he has had enough and gives up but he comes back again, becasue he is not really getting the answer. And finally when he sees what really happened and ho Tom used Jero for his benefit, this twist does come as a surprise and helps us confirm our growing dislike of Tom while also confirming our empathy for Jero. 

Jero has no idea that there’s anything wrong in his relationship, so when he discovers Tom’s letters, he’s plunged into a world he never expected to find himself in. Tom does make it clear in his letters right from the start that he and Jero are very different and likely incompatible. Tom sees Jero as “superficial” and labels himself a hard-working teacher and poet. This allows us to consider that maybe Tom had a good reason to leave Jero. Eventually we learn more about Tom’s overall intentions with Jero, suggesting that Tom may not have been as truly committed to the relationship as Jero was. The film primarily rests on shoulders of the two main actors out of which Jero is the lead. He acts well, is easy on the eyes and walks around most of the film just in his underwear, so there is a lot of eye candy as well. His lean, muscular, hairy young body is constantly on display. Given how Tom's role ends, he performs well but no one from audience will like him. Esteban, who plays Jose's friend also does a good job whose job it is to pick his friend up off the floor and help him move on. Thankfully the ilm doesn't show any secret feelings for each other. They were truly just friends. The film is different but is not without its flaws when you start to look into the details of it but nonetheless it is an interesting premise. The film makes you really think about how each one of us has different takes on the same situation, and it could prove an eye opener for those viewers who walk through life believing their viewpoint is the only one that matters. (6/10)

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Sei no Gekiyaku (Japanese) [Dangerous Drugs of Sex]

Every person has their own unique way of dealing with loss. This film is as much a psychological thriller as it is a soft porn BDSM portrayal of two young men that makes the film overall horrifying as well as humane. It is really hard to describe the genre of this film in one word. Its important not that the film has some really disturbing scenes so if you go into seeing this film, please proceed with caution. Although any sexual non-consensual activity is not ok, this film has its won strange way of showing that suicide is not the only solution to all life's problems. Makoto is a regular office goer, who just finds out that his girlfriend is probably cheating on him. ON top of it, his parents sudden death coming back from a trip that he forced them to take, he gets completely dejected and decides to commit suicide. Unknown to him, he is saved by mysterious man Yoda Ryoji, and he wakes up finding himself tied up in leather and belts in a very BDSM setting. This mysterious saver soo...

One Summer Night (Korean)

I really wanted to like this film but for non native speakers, these movie leaves a lot to be understood and the way scenes were unfolding in front of me, I wasn't sure many times what was really going on. The story had potential button getting any back story on any of the characters limited my ability to empathize with any of these actors. Film starts with two North Korea military guys Yong Joon and Jae Sung having sex and they are caught red handed and they run. Three years later we see Yong Joon in Seoul leading a very mundane and poor life. He has a boyfriend Tae-Kyu, who is a weird guy. He is carefree, doesn't do any work and is completely emotional and financially dependent on Young Joon. In fact, even Yong Joon will go to any lengths to protect him , fend for him and taking care of him to the extent of even taking up prostitution. Suddenly one day Jae Sung appears in their life again. His motivation is not clear but it is obvious he wants Yong Joon back in his life, who ...

The Shortest Distance is Round 3: Fallen Flowers

Continuing with the weird trilogy of "The Shortest Distance", I am so glad that finally I am done with part 3 and won't have to deal with this again in future. Thankfully, as of now the makers have not announced any further parts; which will save all of us on this earth from the embarrassment of watching this in near future. After the first 10 minutes are used in sort of recapping bits of first two parts, the story moves forward. Haruto is now starting to have feelings for Ruka, the mysterious pole dancer from second part. In a fit of rage, Ruka ends up killing the goat man and to save him and Haruto, Shibahara asks them to go underground. Meanwhile Shibahara continues the search for Seiya (the guy who had cut off Haruto's penis). It turns out Seiya is now also taking care of the original club owner from part 1. Both of them were released after they had informed Shibahara of Aoyama's secret location. Shibahara tortures Seiya's boyfriend leading to Seiya killin...