Within the catchy Scandi-pop tune that performs over the top credit of Sauna, Anton Falck’s “All of the Fairly Boys,” the singer fantasizes about being prince charming in a world of lovely males, immune from rejection. From the skin, that dream might sound attainable for Johan, a latest transplant to Copenhagen who has come to the large metropolis to reside extra brazenly as a younger homosexual man. His job working the reception desk at Adonis, a cruisy male-only bathhouse, surrounds him with the sounds, the smells and the sweaty bodily sensations of intercourse and need.

Even the extra squalid facet of Johan’s work — mopping sticky flooring and wiping down vinyl mattresses and glory holes between shifts, when the dim lighting of working hours makes manner for fluorescents — appears tolerable when weighed in opposition to the moment gratification of nameless backroom hookups, one-night stands and hedonistic queer clubbing. These pleasures presumably weren’t so readily on supply in his hometown of Odense. Johan virtually seems to have satisfied himself they’re sufficient. Virtually.

Performed with sensitivity and unwordly innocence by Magnus Juhl Andersen in writer-director Mathias Broe’s affecting debut characteristic, Johan is sort of a unicorn in queer subculture — the tasty blond twink with a good physique and a reasonably face who appears clueless about his worth within the carnal market or the right way to capitalize on it. That’s as a result of all of the meaningless intercourse does little to ease his craving for deeper connection. However that adjustments when he meets William (Nina Rask).

What begins as simply one other Grindr encounter and threatens to fizzle earlier than it even will get going develops into a powerful mutual attraction, each bodily and emotional. It’s a young romance, distinguished by the refusal of Broe and cowriter William Lippert (adapting Mads Ananda Lodahl’s novel of the identical title) to evaluate Johan, at the same time as he repeatedly stumbles in his understanding of elementary variations in the way in which he and his accomplice transfer by means of the world.

What virtually brings their first hookup to an abrupt finish is Johan’s shock once they’re making out and William tells him to not contact his chest, which he retains tightly wrapped whereas saving for high surgical procedure. “I’ve by no means been with a trans man earlier than,” says Johan. William, nevertheless, appears accustomed to the state of affairs, motioning to depart as he flatly responds, “Perhaps it’s best to have learn my profile.” However Johan convinces him to remain, which results in subsequent dates.

The connection evolves in well-observed matches and begins, as Johan and William are drawn collectively and pulled aside by missteps. The pure chemistry between the 2 interesting lead actors makes their disagreements as plausible because the magnetic drive that retains coaxing them to provide it one other strive.

Broe covers contemporary floor in his examination of the relative privilege that homosexual males in accepting environments take as a right in comparison with trans individuals, whose wrestle to say their id will be hindered by ghettoization and financially out-of-reach gender-affirming care.

Johan has a horndog bar buddy who additionally works on the sauna, Asif (Dilan Amin), in addition to good-natured Adonis proprietor Michael (Klaus Tange), who acquired him the job and a spot to reside. However he exists outdoors of any actual sense of neighborhood. William, against this, has a tight-knit circle of trans associates who’re his chosen household, important to his survival.

There are elementary variations additionally of their coming-out tales — William’s well-heeled dad and mom are usually accepting, whereas Johan by no means discovered the braveness to be open together with his father, or to boost the topic once more after telling his mom.

Broe’s personal accomplice started transitioning whereas he was growing the movie, which little question accounts for the private funding — and equal affection — evident on each side of the troubled love story.

In one of many movie’s most poignant moments, Johan lovingly applies Testogel to William’s thighs. In one other, William presents him with the reward of a strap-on, which he makes use of on Johan in a candy intercourse scene with loads of life like fumbling earlier than they discover their rhythm. Solely a queer filmmaker might conceive such a disarming function reversal, through which one accomplice explores his masculinity whereas the opposite symbolically surrenders his.

Johan makes a significant blunder by taking William to Adonis on his night time off with out even contemplating that it may not be a secure house for a trans man. There’s awkwardness within the locker room as Johan strips down unselfconsciously whereas William hides behind a towel and retains his shirt on. However they loosen up into one another as soon as Johan finds them a non-public room, solely to be interrupted by the offended supervisor, yelling “She will’t be right here!” William is gone earlier than Johan even makes it to the locker room.

With William refusing to reply his calls and texts, Johan tries to maneuver on, which proves arduous. Monitoring William to a trans membership the place he’s questioned suspiciously by the door individual, Johan makes an attempt to ingratiate himself with William’s associates, and whereas his intentions are innocent, it’s cringey to look at him pepper them with intrusive questions or make patronizing shows of allyship. Solely the morning after their reconciliation does Johan apologize for the Adonis incident.

William’s difficulties prolong not simply to being excluded from queer locations however to being denied help by the Gender Id Clinic, which refuses to acknowledge that he will be each trans and homosexual. Johan is unable to disclaim it when William confronts him about having no thought what it’s prefer to must rely upon associates to share their further hormone therapies. And Johan’s efforts to bridge the rising distance between them simply appear to verify their incompatibility.

Lippert and Broe’s script veers into extra prosaic territory as Johan will get determined and begins over-compensating, for example by dipping into the door takings at Adonis to assist pay for William’s surgical procedure. This prices him his job and additional erodes William’s respect for him. He hits all-time low in predictable methods, making an attempt intercourse work with an older businessman, or strapping himself right into a sling for use by a string of Adonis clients.

It’s additionally questionable whether or not Sauna actually wanted Michael telling Johan about dropping his accomplice to AIDS within the years earlier than marriage equality, which disadvantaged him of the proper even to attend the funeral. It’s not that the scene feels inauthentic, however intergenerational exchanges like this have change into virtually inventory parts in queer drama.

Nonetheless, no matter some minor script weaknesses, Broe’s handsome first characteristic conveys emotional maturity and a wrenching depth of feeling, with out ever tipping into melodrama. William isn’t good; his bruised demeanor could make him spiky, sullen and sometimes unfair. However there’s one thing quietly heartbreaking in regards to the roadblocks within the relationship as Johan retains making an attempt to second-guess what William wants from him and frequently will get it unsuitable.

Full credit

Distribution: Breaking Glass Photos
Manufacturing firm: Nordisk Movie Manufacturing
Forged: Magnus Juhl Andersen, Nina Rask, Dilan Amin, Klaus Tange
Director: Mathias Broe
Screenwriters: William Lippert, Mathias Broe, primarily based on the novel by Mads Ananda Lodahl
Producer: Mads-August Grarup Hertz
Govt producer: Katrine Vogelsang
Director of images: Nikolai Lok
Manufacturing designer: Signe Krab Nymann
Costume designer: Benedicte Morre
Music: Emil Davidsen
Editor: Linda Man
Sound designer: Mia Terry
Casting: Djamila Hansen
Gross sales TrustNordisk

1 hour 43 minutes