UNDERTOW (PERU/2009/JAVIER FUENTES-LEÓN)

Beloved by much of his community, fisherman Miguel appears to be living the dream with his heavily pregnant wife Mariela. Once alone outside of the house, he lives the other element of his double life, a hidden romance with a painter named Santiago. During a late night rendezvous, Miguel is confused when Mariela fails to notice Santiago’s presence, and he soon learns that his secret lover has drowned at sea. Though he initially believes himself relieved of his guilt, repeated visions of Santiago push Miguel to discover his true feelings, and when Santiago’s ghost asks him to find his body and arrange a proper burial, he stops at nothing to fulfil his wishes.

It is undeniable that Undertow was made with heart, but its first-time director Javier Fuentes-León has a few issues with articulating his message clearly. Using the idea of a ghost to represent intolerance in small communities is inspired and works for part of the film, but it just isn’t believable enough to hit the viewer as hard as it should. Great care has been taken to establish the family environment in Miguel and Mariela’s household – an illuminated religious painting in their living room hints at the couple’s selective participation in religious living – but Santiago is undercharacterised by comparison. In many ways, one should be grateful that the subject isn’t blown out of proportion by melodramatics, but it is easy to miss the gravity of the conclusion if one hasn’t invested all their emotive response in every scene.

THE COUNTRY TEACHER (CZECH REPUBLIC/2008/BOHDAN SLÁMA)

Petr is a young, overqualified science teacher who finds himself working at a school in a small rural village. Although he seems to be coping well in his new environment, some of the local adults are sceptical about his sudden appearance, with the headmaster of the school even raising questions. Petr finds comfort in a kindly woman named Marie, who is grateful for the presence of another man in her life besides her teenage son Lada. After a revelatory visit from his ex-boyfriend Mihi, Petr realises that he has taken this job as a way of running from his identity as a gay man. Worse still, he finds that he has fallen for Lada, who is discovering the joys of love with his girlfriend Bara.

In both content and style, The Country Teacher resembles the Korean feature Bungee Jumping Of Their Own, in which a teacher finds himself drawn to a male student he believes is the incarnation of his departed high school sweetheart. While the latter sounds excessively saccharine, it is the better-handled film of the two. In The Country Teacher, Petr deals with many feelings, including a forbidden attraction, but his stony demeanour means that some of his more surprising actions are hard to believe. In spite of this, the film does handle the dramatic moments realistically, and doesn’t forget the emotions of secondary characters in telling its story. An endearing tale of love and identity, The Country Teacher is no great shakes but definitely deserves a watch.

WILD TIGERS I HAVE KNOWN (USA/2007/CAM ARCHER)

Like any other thirteen-year-old boy, precocious Logan is struggling his way through puberty, but has the added issue of coming to grips with his homosexuality. Logan initially finds an outlet for his pains in straight friend Joey, with whom he ambiguously discusses the sexual potency of the boys at their school, but suddenly finds an object of fixation in the older Rodeo. In his attempts to seduce the teenage rebel, Logan establishes a female alter ego named Leah which he uses to arrange rendezvous with Rodeo over the phone. Throughout the film, Logan’s troubles are echoed by the mountain lions which reside in the area, creatures with which he openly identifies.

Visually, sonically and thematically reminiscent of low-budget documentary Tarnation, Wild Tigers I Have Known is refreshing in that it handles teenage sexuality without overdoing the pathos, or even segregating homosexual relationships from heterosexual ones. But in spite of all this, it’s a terrible piece of work. Lead actor Malcolm Stumpf certainly has the look, but doesn’t do the role much justice beyond the superficial – it’s hard to look at his indie coif and sardonically-mismatched clothes and read ‘troubled child’. In fact, none of Cam Archer’s film is convincing, particularly the arguments he has with his mother. On many occasions, one gets the feeling that Archer, who hails from a background in photography, wants to blindly glamorise the subject rather than give it a voice. Perhaps even more grating is the aimless static soundtrack, which adds nothing to the drama.

THE GIFT (USA/2003/LOUISE HOGARTH)

‘Bugchasing’ describes the practice of actively seeking sex with HIV-positive men, with the express goal of contracting the disease oneself. It is this shocking act which is the subject of Louise Hogarth’s hour-long documentary The Gift. The film goes for the jugular in its portrayal of the facts, opening with an impassioned cry for help from Doug, a gay man who has just learnt that his promiscuity has left him with the disease. Several other case studies reveal naïveté regarding the health risks involved with unprotected sex, and a general misunderstanding of the devastating effects of being HIV-positive. We also meet the individuals who celebrate their disease, tattooing themselves with the biohazard symbol and throwing ‘conversion’ parties. Members of the LGBT community form a vox pop throughout the film to contextualise the issue in mainstream homosexual culture.

Hogarth’s exposé has the best interests at heart, but it is often hard to take seriously as some of the interviewees show a lack of solemnity for the subject. Facts and glossary definitions appear on screen embellished with excessive graphics and house music, as if glamorising the subject. HIV is mentioned repeatedly, but the film does not go far enough in illustrating how damaging it is beyond throwing out the occasional statistic. Nonetheless, it does serve as a vital cautionary tale for an apparently uninformed minority group, as well as conveying a more universal message about trust and health. The Gift provides insight on a fortunately rare practice, but could have gone further.