Allow me to call it "him" here
Nebraska in 1999, the sky is always grey. Beautiful young girls, loud nights, and countless beer bottles, Brandon's first two decades were all mixed up here. He trimmed his short hair, wore a corset every day, stuffed a dildo, lived with his cousin, and did everything a boy would do. Jumping for joy after kissing a girl once. Oh yes, Brandon is a heterosexual, not a homosexual or a transvestite. The Baidu entry says that he "wrongly lived in the current body" God gave him a girl's body and a boy's heart.
"Boys Don't Cry" tells a true story. Teena Brandon, who wanted to be a boy, met his real daughter Lana in a bar and sang "The Saddest Eye in Texas" on stage. Fall in love at first sight, toss and turn for her, do my best for her, live for her, die for her.
The tone of the whole film is gray, the day is gray, and the night is always like being splashed with thick ink, the night is very deep, and deeper than the night is the outline of the distant mountains. There are two brightest tones in the whole film. First, when Lana bails Brandon out of the police station, they rush out of the police station holding hands. The sun is mottled on the faces of youth and love. When Brandon is shot at the end of the film, he collapses in the arms of his lover, a bullet goes through his head, blood is everywhere, the sun shines through the window, the whole room is brightly lit, and Brandon quietly closes his eyes.
Brandon is not gay. For the first 20 years, he lived without any scruples, because he never thought he was any different from John and Tom. He even seriously told his cousin that he was going to marry Lana and go home. At this point in the story, while we all accepted Brandon and Lana, John convicted Brandon on behalf of a real man. The emotional changes in the film are obvious, the first half is very warm, and the second half is very dark. The turning point was that prison, where Brandon went to prison for theft, was paroled by Lana from the police station, and went to another prison. This prison is like hell. No one wants to listen to his heart. He was stripped naked, beaten, and raped by his former friend, John, a man who admired Lana. For a heterosexual, Brandon suffered far more psychologically than the average person, John denied his existence as a man, ruined his worldview, trampled on his personality, and more. I knew it had to be from a true story. Otherwise, it couldn't be so cruel.
When we are young, too many times we speak of despair lightly. An exam, a broken love, a magnified self-inflicted injury, and now, I feel that there is nothing really hopeless, because we do not have a brave soul, like Brandon.
In the movie, John can take drugs, rape, and even shoot people, so why can't Brandon have a way out? In the 1990s, a country that had adopted a relatively tacit attitude towards drugs, guns, promiscuity and decadent life had such strong hostility and hatred for homosexuality, which was basically harmless to society. We are always accustomed to use adjective standards to measure a person, and it seems like how unbearable it is to be different. In just a few decades, someone can cross the huge gap and appeal for the rights and interests of homosexuals and those with gender cognitive impairments. Regarding social civilization, I sometimes wonder, how does it become tolerant and enlightened step by step? Is it a little longer, decades, or a hundred years, enough for the selfish and dark side of human nature to become bright and friendly, enough for marginalized people like Brandon to have a place. Perhaps in the eyes of people at that time, what an incredible thing this should be.
Fortunately, at the end of the film, when Lana knew Brandon's identity, she chose to be with him without hesitation. Gender is sometimes just a symbol. For those poor people who live on the fringes of society, even if you don't have a supportive look, you can ignore them, and your simple efforts can make others breathe.
There is a classic line in "Rebel Girl": "We didn't hurt others, why did others hurt us." Maybe Brandon has been searching for the answer to this question all his life. Sadly, in this world, not all problems are There are answers.
Tina Brandon was born in 1972 and died in 1993.
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