I could talk about how wonderful this film is - languid, sensual, elegiac - but most of all I want to point out to other viewers that the number of beer bottles in the fridge is a clue left by the director as to which parts of the film "really" happened and which are in Ocho's imagination. (Of course, there's no one definitive interpretation with a film like this - your mileage may vary.)
At the start of the film there are 4 beer bottles in the fridge. Alone in the Airbnb apartment, Ocho is bored and takes one out to drink, leaving 3. He spots Javi on the street below, calls him up to the apartment, and they each have a beer before they hook up, leaving just one.
At the very end of the film, we see Ocho alone in the apartment again, and there are 3 bottles - the two that Ocho and Javi drank when they hooked up have mysteriously reappeared, and Ocho is still finishing the original bottle he was drinking by himself at the start of the film.
The middle section of the film, set in 1999, would thus seem to be what "really" happened - and Ocho is reminiscing about it when he returns to Barcelona in 2019 as a newly single man. As he drinks alone on the balcony, first he imagines what would happen if he managed to bump into Javi again now, 20 years on. Then he imagines the future he and Javi could have had if they'd stayed together, a prosaic yet idealized vision of what their lives would be like now. (One can also see the film as showing three possible realities, or believe that everything was real apart from the final 20 minutes, but I think the bottles are a deliberate clue.)
This is how I like to see the film. It's about loneliness (gay male loneliness in particular), missed connections, and the lives we could have lived, for better and worse. It's also an honest, wistful look at gay hookup culture as well as the damage done by the closet and the ever-present fear of HIV. In 1999, both Ocho and Javi are so frightened after their first same-sex encounters that they're physically sick; Ocho is so scared that he may have contracted HIV just from receiving oral sex from a man that he frantically searches the web for information. A lot of us gay guys have felt this death anxiety around sex - whether occasionally or every time we have it - even if we may not like to admit it.
The sex and connection between Ocho and Javi is passionate and sensual when they first meet in 1999. It's still passionate and sensual in the alternate 2019 where they're a couple with a daughter, even if the sex isn't as regular and requires more effort on their part - it's still clear that they love each other and communicate well, and there's a happy mundanity to their relationship. In the 2019 where they just hook up (the opening part of the film), the sex is affectless and mechanical, almost a transaction between strangers, and there's a lack of trust between them. Although they spend the day together, Javi leaves without giving Ocho his number and returns to his husband in Berlin, and Ocho is left alone again.
The acting, direction, cinematography and score are all beautiful. This is a hidden gem.
At the start of the film there are 4 beer bottles in the fridge. Alone in the Airbnb apartment, Ocho is bored and takes one out to drink, leaving 3. He spots Javi on the street below, calls him up to the apartment, and they each have a beer before they hook up, leaving just one.
At the very end of the film, we see Ocho alone in the apartment again, and there are 3 bottles - the two that Ocho and Javi drank when they hooked up have mysteriously reappeared, and Ocho is still finishing the original bottle he was drinking by himself at the start of the film.
The middle section of the film, set in 1999, would thus seem to be what "really" happened - and Ocho is reminiscing about it when he returns to Barcelona in 2019 as a newly single man. As he drinks alone on the balcony, first he imagines what would happen if he managed to bump into Javi again now, 20 years on. Then he imagines the future he and Javi could have had if they'd stayed together, a prosaic yet idealized vision of what their lives would be like now. (One can also see the film as showing three possible realities, or believe that everything was real apart from the final 20 minutes, but I think the bottles are a deliberate clue.)
This is how I like to see the film. It's about loneliness (gay male loneliness in particular), missed connections, and the lives we could have lived, for better and worse. It's also an honest, wistful look at gay hookup culture as well as the damage done by the closet and the ever-present fear of HIV. In 1999, both Ocho and Javi are so frightened after their first same-sex encounters that they're physically sick; Ocho is so scared that he may have contracted HIV just from receiving oral sex from a man that he frantically searches the web for information. A lot of us gay guys have felt this death anxiety around sex - whether occasionally or every time we have it - even if we may not like to admit it.
The sex and connection between Ocho and Javi is passionate and sensual when they first meet in 1999. It's still passionate and sensual in the alternate 2019 where they're a couple with a daughter, even if the sex isn't as regular and requires more effort on their part - it's still clear that they love each other and communicate well, and there's a happy mundanity to their relationship. In the 2019 where they just hook up (the opening part of the film), the sex is affectless and mechanical, almost a transaction between strangers, and there's a lack of trust between them. Although they spend the day together, Javi leaves without giving Ocho his number and returns to his husband in Berlin, and Ocho is left alone again.
The acting, direction, cinematography and score are all beautiful. This is a hidden gem.