This Vietnamese show isn't exactly groundbreaking, but it definitely keeps you hooked. It’s a quick watch with 10 episodes that only last about 15 to 20 minutes each, and even though it uses all the usual BL tropes, it really works because you can't help but root for the underdog. The romance actually takes its time to show up and then wraps up pretty fast, but the characters still feel way more relatable than in a lot of other shows like this. The story follows Phuc, who moves from Hanoi to Saigon to open his dream bar and live with his girlfriend. Things go sideways immediately when he arrives a day early to surprise her and catches her cheating, so he breaks up with her and leaves. He ends up reaching out to his old childhood neighbors, Cong and his sister Han, who he hasn't seen in years. The siblings are struggling on their own with a massive debt and Han’s poor health. Han thinks her brother works at a convenience store, but Cong is actually a heavy for a criminal gro...
It’s about a cop who, after having been called in to investigate the apparent suicide of a transvestite, consults a psychologist to better understand crossdressers. The good doctor then tells him the story of Glen, a man who struggles with telling his fiance that he likes to wear women’s clothing. He fears that she’ll reject him once she knows the truth, and his anxiety grows as their wedding date grows ever closer. Then the doctor tells the story of Alan, a pseudo-hermaphrodite who undergoes a sex-change operation once he gets back home from fighting in World War II. And in between all this, at the beginning of the film and spread through its run time, we have an actor playing some kind of creepy scientist/doctor type that randomly shows up to say spooky things that have nothing much to do with the story at hand.
Told mainly in semi-documentary fashion, this seems like the director's most personal story. I think I read somewhere that he also used to cross dress. The film does try earnestly to educate people on crossdressers and show them in a positive light. While the acting throughout the movie is awful for the most part, it’s not bad enough that it blunts the message that the director was trying to give. Behind the really weird editing the movie tells a lot about transvestitism, transsexualism, relationships, sexual identity and social roles. The second story feels like an afterthought addition. It should actually have been delved deeper but was rushed through instead. With extremely low production value and quality and bad acting, I still feel that somewhere the film's heart was in the right place. Its the execution where it faltered. I wasn't completely disappointed since I constantly kept reminding myself that this is form the 50s, but at the same time, this is not the kind of ilm that I would go about recommending anyone. (3.5/10)
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