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Whether we like it or not, we can only have one part of our partners
"Why don't you ever kiss me?" Mark asks his boyfriend Li Ting in the short film "Floss," by Chinese filmmaker Fan Popo, known for his documentaries "Mama Rainbow" (2012) and "Papa Rainbow" (2016), which address the experience of parents coming to terms with their children's sexual and gender identities in a society where family and face remain paramount. "I just did it," Li Ting replies without flinching. "No, I mean with tongue kissing".
By then, viewers have already discovered that Li Ting is harboring a strange secret: he's obsessed with teeth, both his own and Mark's, but especially with the delicate floss they use daily to clean them. His obsession even drives him to dive into the piled-up trash to retrieve a floss used by his partner. We soon discover that his paranoia has nothing to do with oral hygiene.
If in 'The Drum Tower', her previous work of fiction, also from 2019, Fan posed a story about the budding connection between an introverted student and a transgender shopkeeper in Beijing, in 'Floss' she explores the abject objects of our desire and the often unacknowledged loneliness of love, seen through the relationship between two young people in the Chinese capital that becomes strained after one of them develops an unusual fetish.
In the short film, the Chinese filmmaker (whose work is compared to that of fellow queer filmmakers He Xiaopei and Cui Zi'en for his "direct queer aesthetic", with a "media-savvy" approach, linked to the global LGBT+ movement and advocating for the acceptance of queer people in a more open and diverse society) introduces us to a pair of lovers: Mark (played by Xiao Ke) and Li Ting (Etsen Chen).
In the eyes of others, the two young professionals live a life no different from any other couple: they go out to dinner at luxurious restaurants, and after returning home from walking the dog, they settle down on the couch to watch movies together. Every night, in the bedroom, they have hot, energetic sex, in large quantities.
But an obsession grows in Li Ting's heart. When Mark, after shopping at the market, shows up at the house with floss sticks instead of the usual dental floss, Li Ting can't hide his Dissatisfaction.
That night, during sex, Li Ting shows no interest in emotional intimacy. Time and again, she offers her boyfriend excuses avoiding much more embarrassing situations. Distressed, Mark tells her at one point, "I don't think you like me at all." And he receives silence in response.
Matthias Delvaux's cinematography soon shows us that the photos of a happy couple decorating the apartment bear little resemblance to the sullen couple who live within its four walls.
From this moment on, things visibly change within the couple. Or have the images shown of the couple at the beginning only exposed a false reality, an illusory world? Have the two protagonists truly been happy? Despite the vigorous sex, is there passion? Don't the two seem to be living in separate, different worlds? Doesn't Li Ting look away from Mark while they have sex? Isn't he later tormented by dreams of being bound by a glowing spider web?
And that's when the viewer begins to understand what Fan is trying to tell us: the line between desire and disgust can be so thin that it can be erased at any moment and by any trigger: for some, it might be sweat, saliva, an unwashed body... For others, it's our partner's semen spilled on our chest during sex, blood, and pieces of chewed food.
The neurotic protagonist of the short film is aware of the abject nature of his own fetish. Expressing his obsession also entails shame and the silence that comes with it. That's why he prefers not to kiss Mark; why he chooses to look away when he meets her gaze; why he chooses to remain silent...
How much of ourselves do we hide from the person closest to us? That's the central question that 'Floss' invites the audience to reflect on, as it uncovers an uncomfortable truth: whether we like it or not, we can only have one side of our partners.
What's interesting about the film is that through the sexual obsession with dental floss, something certainly novel, 'Floss' examines contemporary relationships and the secrets we all have and jealously guard.
The film explores the communication barriers that exist between human beings, no matter how close or intimate we are with the people around us. Li Ting's confusion reflects the loneliness of ordinary people, especially those living in big cities.
Li Ting's obsession invites us to reflect on the intimate and idiosyncratic nature of fantasy and the power it wields, especially when it involves some aspect of reality that is often forgotten or forbidden in everyday life, as the Chinese director so aptly reminds us.
Presented at Palm Springs International Short Fest, Queer Lisboa, and Frameline: San Francisco International LGBTQ Film Festival in 2019, and Inside Out Toronto LGBT Film Festival in 2020, in 'Foss' the Chinese director accepts the challenge of tackling themes and approaches little explored by much of current LGBT+ cinema, to focus on the less attractive aspects of love and lust, in this case a fetish, to question the universal model of the monogamous couple.
By then, viewers have already discovered that Li Ting is harboring a strange secret: he's obsessed with teeth, both his own and Mark's, but especially with the delicate floss they use daily to clean them. His obsession even drives him to dive into the piled-up trash to retrieve a floss used by his partner. We soon discover that his paranoia has nothing to do with oral hygiene.
If in 'The Drum Tower', her previous work of fiction, also from 2019, Fan posed a story about the budding connection between an introverted student and a transgender shopkeeper in Beijing, in 'Floss' she explores the abject objects of our desire and the often unacknowledged loneliness of love, seen through the relationship between two young people in the Chinese capital that becomes strained after one of them develops an unusual fetish.
In the short film, the Chinese filmmaker (whose work is compared to that of fellow queer filmmakers He Xiaopei and Cui Zi'en for his "direct queer aesthetic", with a "media-savvy" approach, linked to the global LGBT+ movement and advocating for the acceptance of queer people in a more open and diverse society) introduces us to a pair of lovers: Mark (played by Xiao Ke) and Li Ting (Etsen Chen).
In the eyes of others, the two young professionals live a life no different from any other couple: they go out to dinner at luxurious restaurants, and after returning home from walking the dog, they settle down on the couch to watch movies together. Every night, in the bedroom, they have hot, energetic sex, in large quantities.
But an obsession grows in Li Ting's heart. When Mark, after shopping at the market, shows up at the house with floss sticks instead of the usual dental floss, Li Ting can't hide his Dissatisfaction.
That night, during sex, Li Ting shows no interest in emotional intimacy. Time and again, she offers her boyfriend excuses avoiding much more embarrassing situations. Distressed, Mark tells her at one point, "I don't think you like me at all." And he receives silence in response.
Matthias Delvaux's cinematography soon shows us that the photos of a happy couple decorating the apartment bear little resemblance to the sullen couple who live within its four walls.
From this moment on, things visibly change within the couple. Or have the images shown of the couple at the beginning only exposed a false reality, an illusory world? Have the two protagonists truly been happy? Despite the vigorous sex, is there passion? Don't the two seem to be living in separate, different worlds? Doesn't Li Ting look away from Mark while they have sex? Isn't he later tormented by dreams of being bound by a glowing spider web?
And that's when the viewer begins to understand what Fan is trying to tell us: the line between desire and disgust can be so thin that it can be erased at any moment and by any trigger: for some, it might be sweat, saliva, an unwashed body... For others, it's our partner's semen spilled on our chest during sex, blood, and pieces of chewed food.
The neurotic protagonist of the short film is aware of the abject nature of his own fetish. Expressing his obsession also entails shame and the silence that comes with it. That's why he prefers not to kiss Mark; why he chooses to look away when he meets her gaze; why he chooses to remain silent...
How much of ourselves do we hide from the person closest to us? That's the central question that 'Floss' invites the audience to reflect on, as it uncovers an uncomfortable truth: whether we like it or not, we can only have one side of our partners.
What's interesting about the film is that through the sexual obsession with dental floss, something certainly novel, 'Floss' examines contemporary relationships and the secrets we all have and jealously guard.
The film explores the communication barriers that exist between human beings, no matter how close or intimate we are with the people around us. Li Ting's confusion reflects the loneliness of ordinary people, especially those living in big cities.
Li Ting's obsession invites us to reflect on the intimate and idiosyncratic nature of fantasy and the power it wields, especially when it involves some aspect of reality that is often forgotten or forbidden in everyday life, as the Chinese director so aptly reminds us.
Presented at Palm Springs International Short Fest, Queer Lisboa, and Frameline: San Francisco International LGBTQ Film Festival in 2019, and Inside Out Toronto LGBT Film Festival in 2020, in 'Foss' the Chinese director accepts the challenge of tackling themes and approaches little explored by much of current LGBT+ cinema, to focus on the less attractive aspects of love and lust, in this case a fetish, to question the universal model of the monogamous couple.
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