The story takes place on Christmas Eve. Sandy, who was detained for 28 days for drug possession, regained her freedom, but unexpectedly learned from Alexandra that her boyfriend Jay (James Ransone) was cheating, and the target was a real white woman. , which made her furious, vowing to find her boyfriend and the bitch whose name starts with D. As for Alexandra, who was dragged through the street by Sandy, on the one hand, she urged Sandy to calm down, and on the other hand, she was thinking about the performance at 7 pm, and she sent flyers to everyone to invite them to come and watch. At the same time, the Armenian taxi driver Razmik (Karren Karagulian) is busy driving his car on the road to carry passengers, carrying his family on his shoulders, but not forgetting to satisfy his unknown hobbies.
The plot of "Night Is Young" is very simple. Sean Baker realistically shoots a group portrait of transgender sex workers in Los Angeles' red light district, without deliberately beautifying it to make it a common honey supporting role in mainstream comedy. As time progressed, several groups of characters gradually came together, and the complex relationship that was constantly being sorted out and chaotic heated up the conflict, and finally brewed a wave of climax in the doughnut shop. "The Night Is Young" is very similar to the famous Polish director Roman Polanski's "Carnage" (2011), although the latter scenes are almost all indoors, while the former uses the feet, Taxis, buses and subways roam the streets and alleys of the city, but the stories of both rely on the interspersed scoffing of the characters, peeling back the layers of disguise, and finally pulling out the hidden issues.
The first is the fluidity of gender and sexuality. Whether it's Sandy, Alexandra, or the actors who play these two roles, they're all trans women. Although they are biologically male, their gender identity is female, and their gender is reversed through dress-up or drugs. At the beginning of the movie, Sandy, who had just been released from prison, found that Alexandra's breasts had grown bigger. Alexandra happily said that estrogen was taking effect, and said complacently: "I look genuine." Interestingly, once with a male client In the dispute between the two, Alexandra, who was not to be outdone, once loudly emphasized that "I also have a second child", indicating that she is not a "weak woman" (an oppressed biological woman) who is bullied by others. It can be seen that Alexandra, whose psychological gender is female and eager to become female, will still use the social advantage of biological gender as a weapon for self-protection in a necessary emergency. Simply put, Alexandra shows her agency within the traditional gender dichotomy. Not only gender, but also sexual orientation is not 100% fixed. Jay, who is dating trans women, and Razmik, who buys sex with trans women to satisfy their sexual desires, are both cisgender men, and Razmik even has a family, so are they straight or gay? ? Or is it in between, and wandering at both ends?
"Los Angeles is a beautifully packaged lie," says Razmick's mother-in-law, Ashken (Alla Tumanian). In Sean Baker's deliberately adjusted Tangerine hue, this little Hollywood neighborhood is truly beautiful and warm. However, although the picture is beautiful, it is difficult to hide the cruelty of the story. Gender can be packaged, and sexual orientation is difficult to clearly define. Nothing is absolute or real; in other words, only floating is real. For example, Sandy, she is like a princess in a fairy tale, longing for the prince to give her a lifetime of true love. But when she walked all over the streets and alleys, and the time was getting closer and closer to the night, the love magic gradually failed, and the darkness of the night could not cover up the fairy tale deception. If love is like this, why is the marriage myth derived from love not like this? After Eichken exposes her son-in-law Razmick's secret and tells her daughter Yewa (Luiza Nersisyan), she just wants her mother to leave their housework alone, saying bluntly: "Sometimes a wife can turn a blind eye. The reason why Ye Wa, who already knew about it, was reluctant to expose it, was simply because her husband was the only one who made money to support the family. As a result, the happy family dinner on Christmas Eve suddenly became hypocritical and ridiculous.
Love, marriage and family are like Los Angeles, it is a beautifully packaged lie. If you want to support this lie so that it will not collapse and destroy, it will inevitably make yourself depressed and depressed, and sex trade with transgender sex workers has become a bailout channel. "My family is driving me crazy, and I need to vent," said one of Alexandra's fangirls. He pulled out what little money he had and only wanted Alexandra to caress and help him while he masturbated. In another scene in the film, Razmick takes Alexandra to the car wash attached to the gas station, and the two use the car wash machine to run for just over a minute to conduct a sex trade. There is no soundtrack in this scene, only the sound of water when the machine is running and the sound of cloth flapping on the body of the car, which is extremely realistic but magical. Buying short-term happiness with money can satisfy temporary erotic needs, but can it fill the depression and emptiness brought about by long-term marriage and family life?
Erotic desires are always erratic, and love never ends, and the myth of marriage is not as stable as imagined, but the sisterhood between women is relatively real and not easy to deteriorate. Sandy, who was angrily pulling Dinah (Mickey O'Hagan) to go to Jake to settle accounts, decided to put aside her grievances temporarily and bend over to the bar to support Alexandra when the time came. Even if Sandy and Alexandra turned against each other for some reason, their long-term relationship with each other on the fringes of society could resolve all problems in an instant. At the end of the film, the two take off their clothes and wigs, not only treating each other frankly, but also looking directly at each other's downfall and unbearableness. Because of this, this sisterhood has become the only constant emotion in the movie.
Transgender sex workers and their culture are relatively rare subjects in movies. They are like fireworks of different colors in the night sky, even if they are not noticed, they still bloom. Sean Baker believes that every film is to learn some unfamiliar people and things, perhaps with such a humble attitude, so that "Young at Night" will not become a superficial curiosity. Therefore, these gender issues are more worthy of our understanding and discussion than the news points shot with 3 iPhone 5S.
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