I honestly think this might be the first time I’ve actually enjoyed a proper horror BL. I’ve checked out a few others in the past, but they usually felt a bit unpolished or amateurish—I can’t even remember their names, to be honest. This one is definitely a slow-burn rather than a fast-paced romance, tucked away inside a world of supernatural mysteries and fantastic secrets. You can tell the production is high-quality and well-researched; it feels like the creators really pushed themselves to give the audience something fresh. If you’re into BLs mixed with suspense and ghost stories, this is right up your alley. Just a heads-up: it’s a massive time investment. There are 12 episodes, each over 75 minutes, and the finale is basically a two-hour movie. The story follows Khem, a young guy in his twenties whose life is getting harder by the second because of a heavy family curse that lets him see ghosts. There’s this terrifying rule in his family where the boys don’t live past age 20, so hi...
Martin is sent by his father to retrieve some family document from the family of his deceased grandfather on the southern coast. His closest friend Tomaso decides to join him. They stay at their father’s beach house during this cold time. Almost first hour of the film focuses on the boys randomly walking streets of deserted town, killing time, drinking and smoking and finally picking up certain other young girls and a boy for an evening full of drinking. The next day when Martin goes to the family house again for the second time and has made some progress compared to the first visit, is when he asks Tomaso if the guy back at home is his boyfriend? This is the first time the boys openly talk about Tomaso being gay. Tomes tell Martin everything. More conversations follow before what’s expected happens. Both the boys realize that their feelings for each other might have been more than friends and its time to explore each other as lovers.
This film could have been so much better as a short film or something that would focus on something more concrete. Shaky frames, hand-held cameras, awkward pauses, sharp focus on faces, blue sky, aimlessly wandering; all this become a little too much too handle after a while and you wanna scream for the film to move ahead. The performances of the actors of average at the best but in my opinion, there was only so much they could do. The basic fault lies with the director and the script. This experiment is too much of a self-indulgent where the viewers are taken for a joyride without testing or caring for what they would expect.
There are a lot better teenage coming-out stories which keep you interested and you feel for the characters as well. This one unfortunately doesn’t come anywhere closer to anything. (3/10)
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