Rafiki (2018) -
I'm not really in to lesbian films, mostly because they don't really give me anyone to look at that I might be attracted to (I love a nice bit of cock), but the story of this one was sweet and the lead girls played their parts in a cute, heartwarming way. The story had a touch of the Juliet and Juliet about it, with the rivalry between the lovers parents and their own "Forbidden" love.
It was horrible though to see that such ignorant and brutal attitudes still exist in 2022.
It did make me feel safer in my own world, to see how much more protected I am and that this LGBTQ+ intolerant country is so far away from me, which wasn't necessarily a positive of the film, but more of a silver lining for me as the viewer.
I can't believe that the worlds governors aren't doing more to protect people from these persecution's and to educate the others, because if I think about it too much my head would just explode with rage.
I'm still livid that nearly 40 years on, the efforts of Bob Geldof, Midge Ure and company with the release of Band Aid's - 'Do They Know It's Christmas', doesn't seem to have made much difference to vast numbers of people on the same continent, who still don't have access to fresh drinking water or the most rudimentary medical or educational facilities. There is so much corruption in the world, maybe a Zombie apocalypse would be a good thing right about now?
And so much of the animosity in this story was based in a hate from a religion that has traditionally been meant to be about loving they neighbour instead and that the African's didn't even have until it was inflicted upon them by the West. Of course I don't know what their religious beliefs were before then, but brutally beating someone for eating shellfish would be considered an absolutely awful thing to do now, so why does this so called rule of not lying with another man hold so much power? It's a cliché to use that argument, but that's because it's true.
When things really started to kick off, I couldn't help but think that they would be dead if they were male and actually, in some respects I appreciated the fact that I was watching this film about two girls instead, because I didn't want to relive the trauma of Jake Gyllenhaal's death from 'Brokeback Mountain' (2005) and it was something new to me for that.
It was quite a slow burner and could probably have been a half hour film short featured on the "Girls On Film" DVD's instead, although I obviously understood the importance of it being made at all.
I would definitely have finished it earlier than it did though, because there were too many ending scenes.
I also didn't understand why they dropped in and out of different languages. Sometimes English and sometimes a more local dialect. It made it slightly tough to follow.
And sometimes they would speak and their lips wouldn't move and I didn't know if it was an attempt to be artistic or just a bad edit/dubbing.
It also felt partially improvised at times, but naturally delivered at least and in a good way.
I didn't think that the film quality was that good or maybe it was the camera work, but it seemed like something cheap, made for TV or something. But the editing in general was very good and some of the artistic shots were beautifully relevant and seemingly innocuous, yet they set the scenes well, really putting me in an environment that I didn't know that well at all. The soundtrack was very pretty too.
There was no gratuitous sex shown, which for me, as a gay man, was a good thing, but others might have appreciated some. With that said, I don't think that it would have added anything to the film and might have cheapened the point that the film was trying to make. Sex is beautiful, but it is the thing that grosses some people out about a homosexual/lesbian relationship and could potentially make a loving romance something a bit sordid as it seemed to in 'The Handmaiden' (2016).
I did feel that it had a similarly pointless ending like 'Moonlight' (2016), without much resolution, but this film scored higher for me than that one, because it showed the love more effectively throughout and with more care.
Overall I did enjoy it, which was surprising, as I had expected to turn it off before the first twenty minutes were done, but somehow it captivated me and I needed to see how things turned out for them.
It could perhaps have used a bit of polish, but some of its naïveté may have been what gave it the charm that it had.
708.45/1000.
I'm not really in to lesbian films, mostly because they don't really give me anyone to look at that I might be attracted to (I love a nice bit of cock), but the story of this one was sweet and the lead girls played their parts in a cute, heartwarming way. The story had a touch of the Juliet and Juliet about it, with the rivalry between the lovers parents and their own "Forbidden" love.
It was horrible though to see that such ignorant and brutal attitudes still exist in 2022.
It did make me feel safer in my own world, to see how much more protected I am and that this LGBTQ+ intolerant country is so far away from me, which wasn't necessarily a positive of the film, but more of a silver lining for me as the viewer.
I can't believe that the worlds governors aren't doing more to protect people from these persecution's and to educate the others, because if I think about it too much my head would just explode with rage.
I'm still livid that nearly 40 years on, the efforts of Bob Geldof, Midge Ure and company with the release of Band Aid's - 'Do They Know It's Christmas', doesn't seem to have made much difference to vast numbers of people on the same continent, who still don't have access to fresh drinking water or the most rudimentary medical or educational facilities. There is so much corruption in the world, maybe a Zombie apocalypse would be a good thing right about now?
And so much of the animosity in this story was based in a hate from a religion that has traditionally been meant to be about loving they neighbour instead and that the African's didn't even have until it was inflicted upon them by the West. Of course I don't know what their religious beliefs were before then, but brutally beating someone for eating shellfish would be considered an absolutely awful thing to do now, so why does this so called rule of not lying with another man hold so much power? It's a cliché to use that argument, but that's because it's true.
When things really started to kick off, I couldn't help but think that they would be dead if they were male and actually, in some respects I appreciated the fact that I was watching this film about two girls instead, because I didn't want to relive the trauma of Jake Gyllenhaal's death from 'Brokeback Mountain' (2005) and it was something new to me for that.
It was quite a slow burner and could probably have been a half hour film short featured on the "Girls On Film" DVD's instead, although I obviously understood the importance of it being made at all.
I would definitely have finished it earlier than it did though, because there were too many ending scenes.
I also didn't understand why they dropped in and out of different languages. Sometimes English and sometimes a more local dialect. It made it slightly tough to follow.
And sometimes they would speak and their lips wouldn't move and I didn't know if it was an attempt to be artistic or just a bad edit/dubbing.
It also felt partially improvised at times, but naturally delivered at least and in a good way.
I didn't think that the film quality was that good or maybe it was the camera work, but it seemed like something cheap, made for TV or something. But the editing in general was very good and some of the artistic shots were beautifully relevant and seemingly innocuous, yet they set the scenes well, really putting me in an environment that I didn't know that well at all. The soundtrack was very pretty too.
There was no gratuitous sex shown, which for me, as a gay man, was a good thing, but others might have appreciated some. With that said, I don't think that it would have added anything to the film and might have cheapened the point that the film was trying to make. Sex is beautiful, but it is the thing that grosses some people out about a homosexual/lesbian relationship and could potentially make a loving romance something a bit sordid as it seemed to in 'The Handmaiden' (2016).
I did feel that it had a similarly pointless ending like 'Moonlight' (2016), without much resolution, but this film scored higher for me than that one, because it showed the love more effectively throughout and with more care.
Overall I did enjoy it, which was surprising, as I had expected to turn it off before the first twenty minutes were done, but somehow it captivated me and I needed to see how things turned out for them.
It could perhaps have used a bit of polish, but some of its naïveté may have been what gave it the charm that it had.
708.45/1000.