No Hard Feelings

“I am the future,” Parvis (Ben­jamin Rad­jaipour) mut­ters to him­self in the dark­ness of his bed­room, a promise for his own san­i­ty as a young gay Ger­man-Iran­ian man. In Faraz Shariat’s debut fea­ture, No Hard Feel­ings, Parvis con­fronts the direc­tion of his future and the duplex­i­ty of his own iden­ti­ty against the back­drop of Germany’s refugee programme.

Parvis’ non­cha­lant life of Grindr hookups and hazy gay bar raves is inter­rupt­ed when he’s caught steal­ing and giv­en com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice at the local refugee shel­ter. On his first day as a trans­la­tor, Parvis is left over­whelmed and in tears. Hand­some Amon (Eidin Jalali) approach­es, extend­ing a hand of friend­ship that Parvis grabs. Amon’s viva­cious sis­ter Banaf­she (Banaf­she Hour­maz­di) com­pletes a trio whose bond comes instant­ly, each deal­ing with their own per­son­al plight. For Bana, it’s her depor­ta­tion order; for Amon, it’s his sex­u­al ori­en­ta­tion; and for Parvis, it’s a dis­con­nect to his eth­nic identity.

Shariat’s cam­era glides through neon-lit par­ties before com­ing to a stut­ter­ing halt as Parvis bends over and emp­ties his stom­ach on a street cor­ner. Amon and Bana are by his side hold­ing the blonde wig from his face; in this small town, the broth­er-sis­ter duo is his life­line. As their con­nec­tion deep­ens so do feel­ings between Amon and Parvis. It is Amon who makes the first move, lean­ing over the bath­tub to ten­der­ly kiss Parvis. Lips move but words are lost some­where between con­fes­sions and promis­es. Their sweet inti­ma­cy becomes sen­su­al with dap­pled light and entan­gled limbs, their bod­ies indistinguishable.

Beside cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er Simon Vu’s styl­is­ti­cal­ly queer visu­als, Shariat’s elo­quent direc­tion broach­es the real­i­ty of these young lives with a hum­ble truth­ful­ness. Radjaipour’s stu­dious and defi­ant per­for­mance gives bound­less ener­gy to this young man’s inti­mate per­spec­tive. Though Parvis’ self-assur­ance crum­bles in con­ver­sa­tions with his moth­er, ask­ing whether there is an Iran­ian word for gay (there is). Shoul­der­ing the weight of parental expec­ta­tion, Parvis lives in the shad­ow of their sac­ri­fice. Com­fort­able with the label ​‘queer’ but push­ing back against his Iran­ian her­itage, he is between worlds.

Refresh­ing­ly, No Hard Feel­ings rejects the desire for belong­ing. The char­ac­ters’ bod­ies are their home, while any sem­blance of exter­nal sta­bil­i­ty is a rug under their feet. Nei­ther Bana nor Amon has a per­ma­nence – they are souls await­ing a rul­ing. Their con­cern is obvi­ous, but the opti­mism the film emits is unabashed. ​“The world is ours!” Bana screams, echo­ing Parvis’ ear­li­er claim, her voice ric­o­chet­ing as her best friend and broth­er watch proud­ly on.