06/03/2023 - BERLINALE 2023: A drag performer engages in a dance of seduction and death with a closeted drug pusher in this exciting and tense debut by Sam H Freeman and Ng Choon Ping

In Femme [+see also:
trailer
interview: Sam H Freeman, Ng Choon Ping
film profile], with its focus on drag subculture, the mutable notion of identity present in that world also extends to the film’s narrative shape. Inverting the opening scene, where one Aphrodite Banks (the drag alter-ego of lead character Jules, played by Nathan Stewart-Jarrett) struts gamely on stage, gearing up to perform a catty monologue, the film’s plot arc finds this queer expressiveness negated, or re-closeted, to use a charged term. And forsaking the solo showcases of cabaret, or its antecedent vaudeville, the drama instead develops into a pressure-cooker chamber piece for two male roles, fraught with psychosexual menace.

This debut feature by British co-director team Sam H Freeman and Ng Choon Ping was one of the most highly appreciated titles in the Panorama strand at this year’s Berlinale, taking a familiar and now-mainstreamed milieu that’s perhaps lost some of its underground “edge” – that of the drag scene, popularised by RuPaul’s Drag Race – and placing it in contrast with a more “masc” and intimidating form of queerness. The directors also achieve a desirable balance whereby the film is forever tipping (but never quite falling) from its potential classification as a “drama” into thriller or suspense territory, recalling a sinister, Pinteresque and realism-averse strain of British cinema and theatre.

Coming down from the euphoria of being on stage, Jules – still in costume as Aphrodite – heads out to a newsagent for cigarettes; here, he is assaulted by a gang of thugs headed by Preston (George McKay, from 1917 [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] and the upcoming The Beast), after Jules indicates he noticed him loitering outside the nightclub before the show, amorously catching his glance. Preston, decked in tattoos denoting a prior prison stint, is described later on by another character as a “bulldog who’s been dropped on its head a few times”, and this propensity for violence seems to emerge as a protective shield, deflecting his true sexual orientation.

Cut to three months later, and Jules has forsworn his performing career, its association tainted by the homophobic abuse he suffered both in this instance and in previous occurrences – a detail his boyfriend Toby (John McCrae) fills in. Loitering at a dank, chiaroscuro-lit sauna (further showing his alienation from a more supportive, comradely queer space), Jules runs into who else but Preston, not recognising his former victim now devoid of make-up. They hesitantly begin a courtship defined by rough, clandestine sex, and also Jules’s internal debate about gaining revenge, no matter how their bond productively challenges his understanding of male gender fluidity.

It’s not coincidental to praise how perfectly poised Femme appears at its halfway mark; by its climax, the role reversal, and the sense of comeuppance planned for Preston, feels schematic, at least until a brilliant coda making use of a single prop item of clothing, which has accrued gradual weight across the narrative. And highlighting mere props, rather than native cinematic features, gets at the heart of Freeman and Choon Ping’s success (and indeed, the latter made his reputation in the British theatre world): Femme feels derived from the minimalism of a black-box performance space, in the best possible manner, as McKay and Stewart-Jarrett thrash at and stalk one another with a heavy-breathed intimacy, which the big screen also amplifies to a tee.

Femme is a production by Agile Films, with support from BBC Film. Its world sales are overseen by Anton.