Today I would like to introduce you to a Hong Kong gay movie - "Uncle Uncle".
The film was recently named one of the "Top 10 Chinese Films of 2019" by Asia Weekly, the world's first international Chinese current affairs weekly.
There is no young and handsome little fresh meat in the film, but it tells the story of the elderly comrades in the "deep cabinet" in Hong Kong. The film meticulously depicts the late spring affair of two elderly male comrades, the two protagonists live with their respective families, and both are fathers who have not come out to their families. They meet in the park, carrying their families behind their backs, and embark on a tug-of-war between love, self and family.
This is the first time that a Chinese film has ventured into the issue of elderly comrades, and the film has received five Golden Horse Award nominations, including Best Feature Film, Best Actor, Best Original Screenplay and Best Supporting Actress.
Hong Kong is part of the Chinese cultural circle, through the understanding of the living conditions of elderly comrades in Hong Kong, we can better think about the life of elderly comrades and the elderly and other topics.
The Breakthrough in the Chinese Film Industry allows elderly comrades to be seen
In the film, Bai (70 years old) and Hai (65 years old) are gay men who have been hiding in the cabinet for many years. From a bygone era, they had struggled to build their own families, but they had one thing in common – they were all gay.
A taxi driver who moved to Hong Kong from the mainland as a young man, He and his 65-year-old wife, Qing, have been married for more than 40 years and raised a pair of children, which can be called a model of a traditional happy family of hard work among the older generation of Hong Kongers. But he has always used the convenience of taxis to look around for "one-night stands".
Hai is a retired single father, and his wife left him at an early age to live with his son forever. Although living with his son's family, because of his sexual orientation, there is an invisible chasm between father and son, and there is no sense of home.
Two old men who look "normal" and happy to outsiders, their loneliness and inner confusion are known only to them. The story told in the film is that they met each other on the last road of their lives.
There is no shortage of pictures of two elderly people kissing each other's skin. From the mutual snuggling and sweet kissing on the beach to the erotic hand-to-hand entanglement, the film depicts the old comrades over sixty years old with delicate brushstrokes, the inner depression and lust.
Behind the twilight love, in addition to the dialogue with the self, the story is to portray the contradictions and struggles of the elderly comrades facing the family, facing history, and facing social responsibility. Behind the dilemma faced by the two protagonists is a knot pulled by the three parties of concepts, human nature and ethics.
The director does not make a moral expression of the story in the film, but he presents the irreconcilable contradiction between "being yourself" and "hurting the family" in front of the audience. Right or wrong, the film leaves the judgment to the audience.
At the end of the film, the legislative advocacy of gay nursing homes is mentioned, which makes this film not only speculative but also social.
After its premiere at the Busan Film Festival in South Korea, "Uncle Uncle" attracted wide acclaim, and was later nominated for five awards at the Golden Horse Awards for Best Feature Film, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Original Screenplay.
"Asia Weekly" praised the film, "can be described as a courageous and courageous breakthrough work, with the two male protagonists over 60 years old talking about love, oil, salt, sauce and vinegar as the content, revealing their inner depression and lust." It is only when I am old enough to meet true love, and this twilight romance reflects the dilemma in the traditional social concept."
In Hong Kong, there is no rainbow after the "old comrades" come out
"We have been regulated by society all our lives, and some of us have children. Old people want to be themselves, can they?" As the protagonist asked in the film, the biggest significance of this film is to let the issue of "elderly comrades" get the attention of the gay community and even the mainstream society, and arouse people's thinking.
"When comrades get old, everyone throws them aside as garbage and waits for them to finish (dying)," yang Yaokai, the film's director, said in an interview with the media, the older generation of Hong Kong people from the 50s and 60s, often for the family's livelihood to work several jobs, very hard, for the development of Hong Kong to dedicate their youth.
The comrades among them, under the influence of the traditional concept of Chinese society, married and had children, maintaining the identity of "normal people" recognized by society. Today, they are not only saddled with the "shame" and "guilt" that history has weighed on them, but also face the struggle for self-identification, as well as dissent from society and family.
Yang Yaokai said that there are many gay places such as bars and saunas in Hong Kong, but these places will exclude the elderly. He once listened to a 70-year-old man talk about going to a gay sauna.
The old man recounted that when he came to the sauna, the staff told him, "Only members can enter." He asked, "How do you become a member?" The staff replied, "Full." But in the course of their conversation, a young man walked straight into the door.
In today's gay community, it seems that everyone loves young, handsome, muscular young people, gay men will be called "old gay" at the age of thirty, and lesbians at the age of 40 will be called "old lady".
Therefore, even if old comrades unload their lifelong sense of self-shame and achieve self-identification in their later years, they often do not have the environment to come out. Because after coming out, it will not only be difficult for old comrades to get family recognition, but also will not be accepted by the gay community.
"There is no place to accommodate them," Mr. Yang said, adding that the society did not have an environment to speak, gather, or even entertain. He believes that our society should pay more attention to the elderly comrades, and there should be more voices telling them that being a comrade is not a shame, nor is it their fault, and that they can identify with their sexual orientation and understand themselves.
When comrades are old, where should they go?
In that era of material scarcity, the system of mutual support that depended on the family was the core form of individual survival. That's why, "Do you want to come out to your family?" , "How do I come out?" These problems that make the younger generation of comrades toss and turn, for the older generation of comrades, thinking is already a luxury, let alone a real choice.
Today's gay places are full of discrimination against elderly comrades and low-level comrades, and Jiang Shaoqi, a professor at the University of Hong Kong and the author of "Male Biography: Oral History of Older Male Comrades in Hong Kong", pointed out in the article that although some young gay men do have a good feeling for older gay men, the love of the year is often regarded as suspicious plunder and deception.
Therefore, Jiang Shaoqi believes that if we really have to face the reality of the life of elderly comrades, developing the topic space of cross-generational love will be an unavoidable path for the gay movement.
"The old man is safe" is one of Confucius's expectations for an ideal society in the Analects, and I hope that the old man can enjoy happiness. However, in a rapidly changing society, this sentence can also read another meaning - where do the old people want to go? Perhaps through this film, we will begin to think about it - when the comrades are old, where should we go?