Part of my coverage of the 54th Chicago International Film Festival.
MARIO **1/2
Marcel Gisler
2018
IDEA: When Mario falls in love with the new recruit on his football team, censure from within and outside the league threatens both men's chances of going pro.
BLURB: It’s an axiom of media both LGBT-focused and otherwise that the locker room, and the world of athletics it supports, are social domains rippling with homoerotic undercurrents. Men change, bathe, and perform a variety of physical activities within close proximity, fostering a communal intimacy based on often unconscious body-first relations. For gay folks, this dynamic is compounded by a sexual component that is typically disavowed and shunned by the heteronormative sports community to which they belong, leading to tensions between the individual and the team, between transparency and concealment, that can be tricky if not impossible to negotiate. Mario takes off from this point, telling a story of two footballers whose romance jeopardizes their careers. The dilemma becomes discomfitingly clear, fast, forcing the men to decide what matters to them more: going pro or living an open and honest life. Despite the smartly understated, committed performances from Hubacher and Altaras and a keen sense of personal and professional stakes, the film does little unique with this scenario, taking the prosaic route with material that certainly has potential for a more evocative telling. While there is something to be said of a relationship drama that so genuinely feels for both of its participants, that rather than taking sides demonstrates equal sensitivity to their respective choices, Mario doesn’t quite generate the same passion for its lovers as they show for each other.
BLURB: It’s an axiom of media both LGBT-focused and otherwise that the locker room, and the world of athletics it supports, are social domains rippling with homoerotic undercurrents. Men change, bathe, and perform a variety of physical activities within close proximity, fostering a communal intimacy based on often unconscious body-first relations. For gay folks, this dynamic is compounded by a sexual component that is typically disavowed and shunned by the heteronormative sports community to which they belong, leading to tensions between the individual and the team, between transparency and concealment, that can be tricky if not impossible to negotiate. Mario takes off from this point, telling a story of two footballers whose romance jeopardizes their careers. The dilemma becomes discomfitingly clear, fast, forcing the men to decide what matters to them more: going pro or living an open and honest life. Despite the smartly understated, committed performances from Hubacher and Altaras and a keen sense of personal and professional stakes, the film does little unique with this scenario, taking the prosaic route with material that certainly has potential for a more evocative telling. While there is something to be said of a relationship drama that so genuinely feels for both of its participants, that rather than taking sides demonstrates equal sensitivity to their respective choices, Mario doesn’t quite generate the same passion for its lovers as they show for each other.
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