Ugly in aesthetic, ugly in spirit, ugly in politics, ugly in musicality, ugly in transness as a get-out-of-jail-free card. It paints reinvention not as freedom but reputation-laundering, with songs that feel like London Road or a bad version of the Maels' work in Annette (there, at least they're atonal on purpose). An oversaturated, miscalculated mess.
A beautifully serene slice-of-life anime that captures that aching feeling of want and yearning -- the desire for the good things in your life to stay calcified forever, the pain of letting someone go for both your sakes, and the way nascent queerness can peel open all the cracks in your existing firmament. Beautiful animation, especially once we lapse into the fairy tale the piece their high school band is playing is based on; the angular, stretched-out character designs of…
"I'm a fag. I'm really fucking gay."
Charming little queerdo indie about a pair of mall Goths going on a cross-country road trip, discovering themselves in the process, yadda yadda. Brilliant pair of central performances, and boy is it great to see Karen Black purr across the screen as an aging karaoke star who has long since accepted the obscurity life has served her. Feels tailor-made for regular rotation on IFC in the early 2000s.
