The Male Gaze: Nocturnal Instincts

I'm not really into short films but turned this selection on when I had a short space of time to spend and no time to watch a feature or even an episode of a series. I came back to the rest of the films the night after.

I have to say that some of the films, indeed most of them seemed to be fighting yesterday's battles and attitudes. There was a strong element of shame running through them from the English film with the lad and his yobbish father through the Belgian film featuring the boys from the East to the Israeli film showcasing the hunky Israeli soldier.

The Chinese film managed to engender a real air of menace with the power cut and darkness - at the end, my imagination ran riot wondering if there would be a grisly death from suffocation as the revenge of the victim.

The Israeli film was pure propaganda attempting to portray Arabs as fully integrated members of society in occupied Palestine. There were even two stereotypes, the faggy Arab bottom and the powerful romanticised Arab top with the massive equipment. Unfortunately there was not a single Arab actor in the cast which exposed the hollowness of the plot and what it was trying to convey!

The Chinese and the Israeli films are the ones that left the strongest impressions on me despite my reservations about the latter. However, the strong memories of the latter might just be provoked by the amount of man flesh on display and the near-porny action. I'm not immune to the attractions of butch Arab guys. I live in an Arab country and the faux-Arab lead juxtaposed with the Russian Jewish soldier was an exciting pairing.

I found the UK contribution to be somewhat limp. Some of the acting was poor at times; the scenes between the lad and his father were more real than those between him and his lover on occasion. I honestly think that there should have been a reshoot of some of the latter interactions as the dialogue was declaimed woodenly at times.

The Belgian film was simply puzzling. I watched it, but I found the motivations of the characters obscure, I didn't know what "the girls" were doing and why they had a part in the action, I couldn't get the final conclusion.

The Swedish film was shocking in its violence and betrayals. But here again we had stereotyping. Cool rational violence from Swedes that involved planning but fury and impulse from the Eastern Muslim.

I wish I could have reviewed each film separately as it's a bit unfair to give an overall mark. Some of these films were much better than the others. However, it can't have been that bad as I shall be seeking out a couple more short film collections and perhaps be watching them when I'm settled down rather than just to fill in a bit of time.

In the first film in this collection of shorts there is a spiral. I like short films but this selection seemed to me to be a spiral into despair, sexual violence, and in their way too many of the characters bordered on self-hatred. Is this the way Gay/Queer film is going I wondered ? The first two I found garish, and relentlessly disturbing. Things settled down with the British film, but the acting was poor and the ending negative and full of loneliness. It could have been made decades earlier, and despite the fact that a young man cannot face his homosexuality and ends up huddled and alone can be real, I like to think things have got better for a lot of people. The Belgium film was well made but the all pervasive pessimism was overwhelming. I believe the world of poverty is sadly realistic, but I could not stomach the attempted killing induced by self-loathing and rejection. The film from Israel again was well acted, but the premise of the orgy depicted is not for all, and yet it was somehow the best of the lot. Having just watched Demy's ' Lola ' I felt impatient with the sheer darkness of these films. There is a distinction between a love of life, despite its inevitable losses and this wallowing in a despair that would have startled Samuel Beckett, for the utterly hopeless depiction of certain mindsets bent on self-destruction, and futile risk. I give it a 4 overall for the acting in the Belgian film and the film from Israel. I also found in the Israeli film a final scene of heartbreaking tenderness, in a collection which lacked this except for this last scene. The irony of it is that it was between a young man and an older woman.