Vague Visages’ Femme review contains minor spoilers. Sam H. Freeman and Ng Choon Ping’s 2023 movie features George MacKay, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett and Aaron Heffernan. Check out the VV home page for more film reviews, along with cast/character summaries, streaming guides and complete soundtrack song listings.

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Homophobic hate crimes are on the rise all over the world, which makes Femme, the debut feature from writer-directors Sam H. Freeman and Ng Choon Ping, a controversial proposition. Adapted from their award-winning 2021 short of the same name, the film follows Jules (Nathan Stewart-Jarrett), a drag artist who gets brutally beaten after a show. He subsequently meets his attacker, Preston (George MacKay), in a gay bathhouse by chance and strikes up a sexual relationship with him in a desperate bid to expose the man and gain some kind of retribution for his crime. 

Femme establishes itself as boundary-pushing right from the outset with its bold, attention-grabbing title, which notably doesn’t drop until after the assault has taken place, the stark white font and lack of any accompanying score forcing viewers to contend with what is still a loaded term in queer culture — “no fats, no femmes,” etc. Months later, Jules has been visually broken down; a man who once proudly dressed in a big fur coat, towering heels and stunning makeup reduced to sitting in the dark playing video games alone. Stewart-Jarrett’s character remains in his drag outfit after stepping offstage, but his fear is evident in how he pauses before venturing down a dark alleyway to the corner shop, jumping at the sound of a door closing as he slowly edges down the street. Jules knows that he’s taking a risk. 

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“Is that a bloke? Fucking f*****s, man,” spits Preston, full of venom upon simply spotting Jules quietly waiting for his cigarettes. The ensuing assault is purposely tough to watch, vicious and shot with tight close-ups as Preston and his cronies film it on their phones for maximum humiliation. The use of handheld cameras in this scene only adds to the brutality, making viewers complicit in the violence. Freeman and Ping employ both repeatedly throughout their frequently unbearably tense movie while the propulsive score, by Adam Janota Bzowski (who also tackled the similarly taut Saint Maud), mimics a racing heartbeat as Jules delves further into Preston’s world, making his intentions murkier.

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Someone once so proud to stand out is suddenly doing everything he can to blend in as much as possible. Jules curls into the window on a bus as he tries to make himself appear smaller while avoiding making eye contact with anyone. By getting to know his attacker, Jules gradually learns to stand tall once again as he flips the power balance between them until it’s unclear who’s using who. As played by the enigmatic MacKay, Preston is a self-hating homophobe with a bad temper doing a performance of a performance, essentially trying to convince himself he’s a hard man since otherwise he’ll be forced to confront his true nature. MacKay, a fascinating performer whose choice of roles is always devilishly surprising, is closer to True History of the Kelly Gang than 1917 in Femme.

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MacKay’s angular features, accentuated by some dodgy neck tattoos make Preston look like he’s about to snap at any time. But underneath it all, he’s just as terrified as Jules, albeit for very different reasons. MacKay is in such control of his face that when Preston briefly softens, he looks like a school child, thanks to the actor’s boyishly good looks, with his wide eyes betraying an ocean of hurt rippling just beneath the surface. When the gravity of everything that Preston has done finally hits, the camera remains tight on MacKay as he communicates a raft of emotions with his features.

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The English actor has electric chemistry with Stewart-Jarrett, without which Femme wouldn’t work. The story is complicated by the sexual relationship between their characters, and though the protagonists’ bond is clearly dysfunctional and even arguably downright abusive, it’s also hugely intriguing. The love scenes are frequently violent, but they’re also intensely sexy. Crucially, Jules and Preston don’t kiss until an hour into Femme, and the moment when they do is one of the only real instances of release in the film, which is otherwise tightly wound like a chord as the tension ratchets up consistently.

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Stewart-Jarrett, who appeared in Nia DaCosta’s Candyman but will be most familiar to British TV fans for the underrated Misfits, has the less showy role in Femme but does some truly brilliant work. As Jules, much of his journey is internal, though the towering performer plays with his physicality in a similar manner to MacKay, particularly when he’s forced to interact with Preston’s aggressively straight friends. Jules alters his voice to sound more masculine around them, emphasizing the movie’s central message about how everybody is performing at least to a certain extent, especially with gender representation. As he acknowledges to his own friends, it once felt like his drag persona, Aphrodite Bang, was “the real me” and that he was “the performance.” Although it’s important for Jules to eventually get back onstage, the real transformation has nothing to do with makeup or clothes. 

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The stark difference between Jules’ friends and Preston’s also showcases just how much he’s missing out on by remaining firmly in the closet. Preston looks stiff and uncomfortable around them, with one unintentionally hilarious shot of him sulking in a club while manspreading in an all-white Adidas tracksuit providing a neat visual shortcut for how isolated he feels even in settings that are, ostensibly, where he should be most at home. It’s understandable that Jules feels sorry for Preston, given the amount of queer joy he experiences on a regular basis with his loud-and-proud roommates and BFFs, one of whom encourages Stewart-Jarrett’s character early on to snap out of it and rejoin society by telling him simply, “Every time you do this, you’re letting them win.” 

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Likewise, the club where Jules performs is shrouded in darkness, as though he works in a temple where people come to worship each night, which — if you’ve ever been to a drag show — feels accurate. Drag Race may have commercialized it for straight people, but it’s worth noting that this is more representative of how drag is typically experienced in real life. Jules’ delightfully cluttered shared home is lit with enormous warmth, while Preston’s place feels more akin to an office building, given the nondescript furniture and abundance of grey. The sauna where their paths cross is lensed with a blue hue, suggesting it’s a safe space for Jules where he might also find some semblance of hope again. The effect is neo-noir with a queer flourish. And suffice it to say, Femme is worlds away from the disappointingly conservative All of us Strangers. 

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Some believe that to meaningfully redefine queer art as far from suffering as possible, it should be completely inoffensive, but Femme showcases the true depth of the queer experience by refusing to sand down its edges. Aside from presenting a bracingly subversive take on homophobia, sexuality, love and revenge, the writer-directors decline to provide any sense of resolution. Femme is lean, mean, nasty, challenging, knotty, uncomfortable and disorientating — often all at once. A terrific encapsulation of the beautiful queer experience and the struggle to find belonging both internally and in society at large, Freeman and Ping’s film is anchored by two equally stunning performances and a complete defiance of straight expectations.

Joey Keogh (@JoeyLDG) is a writer from Dublin, Ireland with an unhealthy appetite for horror movies and Judge Judy. In stark contrast with every other Irish person ever, she’s straight edge. Hello to Jason Isaacs.

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