Shot in stark black and white, this provocative film from actor-turned-director Jun Li follows a young nameless gay man (Jayden Cheung, in a remarkable, daring debut) on an erotic travelogue of Hong Kong, moving from hookup to hook-up while quietly assuming the persona of his latest sexual encounter.
Whether assuming the role of a scientist, architect, actor, teacher, or delivery man, each meeting is quick — a mix of sex, conversation, and roleplay with the international gay tourists in Hong Kong — trying, maybe, to get at something real. Beneath the veneer, conversations crackle — sometimes political, sometimes tender, sometimes both. In these encounters, bodies and performance crash into each other — deeply personal, occasionally awkward, and tinged with unease. Rather than smoothing that out, Queerpanorama leans into the mess, asking what it actually means to be seen in a city built on speed and surface.
Preceded by Carpobrotus (Dir. Simon Frenay, 22 Minutes)
It's summertime, and three friends — Maxime (writer/director Simon Frenay), Yann (Passages' Erwan Kepoa Falé), and Laura (Juliette Savary) — are spending a few days on a wild Mediterranean island. Maxime loves Yann passionately, but doesn't know if his feelings are shared. It's in this quest for love that Maxime immerses himself, at the risk of losing himself, between dream and desire. Frenay's previous directorial outing, Youssou & Malek, screened at Frameline47.