This is a lovely story about the struggles of a Muslim young man in France, in the search for his sexual awareness and the building of his own self-chosen subjectivity beyond gender, religious, political labels.
In his quest he finds an LGBT center in Lyon which acts as an empowering, nurturing but diverse environment. There, while Hicham tries to take a stance for a self-assumed gay life, he also discovers and questions the ways of activism, political and social debate, ethics, enjoyment, social reform and family relationships. His journey also means a liberating experience for his sister, who finds new ways of addressing reality and a place for herself while trying to understand his Muslim gay little brother.
This is a 10-part web series consisting of 10-minutes episodes, which is an innovating narrative format for audiovisual productions. The episodes, so brief in themselves, require a narrative economy or simplification which may be seen as a plus or a minus, depending on the perspective. I have not found them disturbing nor failing. On the contrary, they give the show a kind of "refreshing approach" about the importance and meaning of grass-root empowering movements, while avoiding the heavy undertones so frequent in the ruminations of more ambitious or pretentious stories. It is true that the whole show leans towards didacticism, yes, but this is not necessarily a bad thing if it is well thought and filmed.
Despite the light-hearted approach, contradictions and power struggles are pervasive along the episodes, both within the center and within the characters, and the well-devised dialogues are spilled with wise one -liners and reflections ("Activism is like trying to empty the ocean with a teaspoon (but even so...)".
The whole 10-part story is barely 100 minutes long, the average length of a not-quite-long movie. But the serial treatment allows for a more focused progression of Hachim's self-awakening journey, which is reflected in the episodes' titles: Running Away / Gathering Together / Opening Up / Kissing Each Other / Emancipating / Clashing / Discovering, and so forth.
It is a very remarkable experiment in short-episodes narrative with commendable performances and an excellent direction. Congratulations to the team involved!
