Wir

I wasn't sure what to expect when I first watched this but thinking back on it in it was a actually a really good film in all that it presented. The acting was good, it had a good story and it came off pretty authentic for the most part. It's a film I would watch again.

The German film Futur Drei was shown in the U.S. with the title No Hard Feelings (2020). (For some reason, IMDb lists the title as Wir. No explanation.) The movie was co-written and directed by Faraz Shariat.

Benny Radjaipour plays Parvis Joon, a young man of Iranian descent, who was born in Germany. For a relatively trivial offense he is sentenced to 120 hours of community service, which he completes at a refugee center.

Banafshe Hourmazdi as Banafshe and Eidin Jalali as Amon are brother and sister refugees, who live in the center and are seeking asylum in Germany. Amon and Parvis are gay, and they fall in love.

The plot of the movie tries to answer the difficult question of whether love is possible in the context of a pending forcible return to a country where gays are under attack.

I thought the movie was excellent and the entire film was clearly the work of a talented director and talented actors.

We saw this movie as part of Rochester's wonderful ImageOut LGBTQ Film Festival. (Shown virtually.) The movie has a borderline IMDb rating of 6.9. I thought it was much better than that, and rated it 9.

The title of my review is because it's not only a gay movie but it talks about so many things at a time. The belonging, freedom and cultural diversity and especially in a refugee center. The guys are super handsome and there is so much of depth. It's a bit longer and 10-15 minutes could have been shorter.

Born in Germany to Iranian parents, Parvis is an outsider, being gay in the Iranian community, and an "ethnic" within the gay community. Given community service as a translator and general help in an refugee camp for Iranians who are hoping to be allowed to stay in Germany (and who view Parvis with suspicion), he manages to befriend a brother-sister duo, though he definitely has eyes on the brother.

This is another of these films where I wish I could tell whether they were speaking German or Farsi. Some things might be lost in translation. There are various elements of the story that need better explanation. There are some dream sequences that I found superfluous, wishing that they had spent more time sketching out some of the secondary characters. However, the young cast is adorable.

The themes in this film are well known to me. I live in a Muslim country so I know the attitudes towards gay men that are overtly displayed in contradiction to the enormous prevalence of secret man on man action that is often carried out by the very same guys who are being so disparaging. I also worked with refugees for some years in the nineties in the UK and have seen the crushing of spirits caused by refusals of asylum applications.

Parvis and Amon make a handsome couple but their relationship is shot through with the discrepancies mentioned above. Amon dare not let his mates know what's going on. His sister is fine with the issue as are Parvis's parents.

The scenes of birthdays, parties, clubs, young life are all what we would see any young people enjoying. These youngsters just want the freedoms we have in the West and that are denied to them in their own country. They would be assets to Germany. Indeed, Parvis is, as he has a German passport.

I found the dialogue, even from the more minor characters, to be totally appropriate and relevant.

However, coming through all this is a nostalgia for "back home". As an emigré, I have it. How much stronger it must be for those forced to leave for whatever reason.

This was ninety minutes I certainly didn't regret in the slightest.