One of the viral videos before that word even existed recovered an interview from El Fary, in which he forcefully stated that he detested “the soft man.” He was referring to “that man with the shopping bag and the child’s stroller.” Fary also added that he had “been able to analyze that women do not accept soft-hearted men either.” Not only that, but she took advantage of those men who fell outside the established stereotype. That video, repeated and laughed at ad nauseam, expressed a way of being a man that has lasted to this day.
The man must be tough and strong. Adjectives that are associated with what is called masculinity. They cannot show their feelings, nor cry. They cannot deviate from the established pattern. They must be womanizers, they really like women. Make tongue-in-cheek comments. And of course not helping their partners. It may seem from another world, but seeing certain comments from far-right politicians one understands that toxic masculinity, that the lifelong straight male, is still more current than it should be. There are also the podcasts of people like Roma Gallardo, with thousands of followers and displaying sexist comments and lessons of heterozo.
To fight against this, Norwegian director Dag Johan Haugerud has arrived, opening his trilogy Sex, Love and dreams with the film dedicated to sex, although it really focuses on masculinity. A humanist film to put an end to those straight males. He does it with his hallmarks, letting the characters speak and the stereotypes fall. Here he does it by confronting two friends, chimney sweeps by profession – a profession linked to strength and the traditionally masculine – who one day make a confession to each other. The first says that he has had a sexual experience with another man, but that he does not consider himself gay because of it. The second he dreams of becoming a woman and is seduced by David Bowie.
The filmmaker takes advantage of this excuse to ask himself what it means to be a man, why it is so scary for many men to recognize attraction for other men, and if we don’t always move in tight boxes denying the possibility that there is something in between. A reflection on identity that proposes new masculinities and forms of couples and friendship. For the filmmaker, the idea starts from “talking about issues that are seen in a very conventional way in society, such as masculinity.”
“We still have a very traditional view of what it means for something to be masculine or feminine. In Norway, the government has organized a kind of meeting of people who come together to talk and debate about masculinity in order to do something about the male role in society. The only thing that has come from this is to strengthen the traditional view of what a man is. That’s why I think it needs to be discussed much more. And I think sexuality is a very important part of it,” he explains about his film.
He objects to anyone who falls outside of that stereotype being singled out and put in another box: “If you’re not sure what you are like as a man, if you don’t know what you like, then they tell you that you’re not an ordinary heterosexual, and Therefore, you must be gay. That’s why the film also talks about our need to identify sexuality and reduce it to some type of sexual identity, something that is limiting our lives and is not liberating. It can be. I’m not saying it’s not liberating to come out, but it doesn’t have to be if it means a very narrow definition of who you are. sex “Wants to open the debate about what sexuality really is and whether it is possible to have sex with whoever you want without having to identify as gay, straight or bisexual.”
‘Sex’ wants to open the debate about what sexuality really is and if it is possible to have sex with whoever you want without having to identify as gay, heterosexual or bisexual
Dag Johan Haugerud
— Filmmaker
In this game of masculinities, he chose two chimney sweeps, because “it is an occupation that is considered very masculine,” but upon researching them he discovered that they also “have a very high level of professional integrity and are proud of their profession.” Furthermore, other people perceive them as “mysterious because of how they have been portrayed in literature or film,” so he thought it was a good place to place his plot.
A film that arrives at a time when new generations flirt with the extreme right and have as references youtubers who advocate and defend a return to the stale masculinity of traditional values, something that worries the filmmaker and makes him wonder why he is passing. “We have experienced sexual liberation, we have the feminist movement, and yet we return to a very narrow vision of what men are like. It is important to fight to tell them that they do not have to be like this, that they can be another way, to show them an alternative,” says Dag Johan Haugerud.
After sexit will be love the next film that arrives, although I really proposed this as the closing of the trilogy and dreams like the second part, which will be about a teenager and her sexual awakening. Despite there being three films, he sees them as “a whole” even though the theme of one does not affect the next and can be enjoyed independently: “Actually they all talk about the same thing, because they all talk about sex.” , dreams and love, although perhaps one addresses one of the topics more than the others”
In all of them he highlights the humanism with which he approaches each subject, something that is important to him: “All the films I made are about ordinary people in everyday life. That’s where our life really is. I think the conflict really lies in the way we talk to each other. The way we talk to each other, the dialogues we tell each other, can help us expand our lives.”
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