A rendering of the human condition in classical tragic form

Rating: 10/10 (28 December 2005)

"Two men who fall in love with each other" is as inappropriately simple a description of this film as any attempt to justify the human condition that engulfs their lives would be acceptable. A story that closes in tight on the idealistically dreamed of world where individual and unique qualities of a human super-cede gender as a precluding rule of engagement. There is an uncommon expression here of the human possibility for self release, from the expected roles and accepted impulses of love. The mutual attraction is against what each knows instinctively, without comment or discussion, is "wrong" in their world. There is no judgment or preaching here as to the right or wrong of their friendship because the inherent rejection of their feelings by everyone in their world is fundamentally understood. The wonderful thing in this film is that the two men offer and share this secret with a presence and submission that avoids the self questioning angst so often thrust upon characters who for moral and box office approval must twist in turmoil and guilt. It is not a film about gay men. It is a film about two men. Period. They like each other and cannot stop from taking this attraction to levels so intense that the tragedy rests in seeing a human condition unable as yet to allow this attraction to simply blend into the scape of life without undo attention or judgment. To dislike this story you must be more than homophobic, you must be human-phobic.