booyah, fordham law

Leviticus tells the story of two queer teenage boys in their religious small town. Even though it takes place on the outskirts of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia, the film feels surprisingly Southern Gothic in nature. And while the Australian Gothic genre exists, Leviticus specifically engages with themes found in the Southern Gothic, such as protestant fundamentalism, religious hypocrisy, the grotesque, decay and ruin, hauntings, and the supernatural. The "other" is feared and therefore hunted down; Naim, Ryan, and Hunter are proof of that.

The dilapidated building in which Ryan and Naim have their intimate moments together, the painstakingly straight lines and the uncanny feeling you are left with in the architecture of the church—these buildings are meant to fill you with a sense of dread and that something isn't quite right.

For a film in which having people around is deathly important, it does a good job of using empty space to fill the air with tension—so much so that even when the boys are around other people, you are unable to fully relax and savour the tender moments. This, I feel, is an excellent way of putting the viewer in the perspective of the boys.

When Naim's mother finds out about his queerness, her instinct isn't to leave town—a town she thinks has just hate-crimed a queer boy—and take her son somewhere safer. Instead, she gives her son unto the Deliverance Healer to "remove" the gay from him—the very same Deliverance Healer who performed the ritual on the now-dead, hate-crimed gay boy.

She puts her own comfort in her newfound community above her son. Moreover, she dismisses his cries for help. "Get your stuff out of my room," and "we need fear, Naim. It's how we stay alive."

It is of my understanding that Naim's mum cannot stand to have hard conversations or deal with difficult subject matter. Which is why she leans so heavily into the church, why she plays worship music right after Ryan and Hunter's ritual, and why she has the ritual done to Naim.

Her addressing his queerness would be too much for her, and so she doesn't. She just gives him to the Deliverance Healer to have a one-and-done with it so she can wash her hands of the matter and put it out of her mind. However, in a twisted fate of irony, her refusal to engage with this side of him and the realities that come with it ultimately harms him.

As I was watching the ending, it felt like the film was symbolic of how trauma—of any kind—will never fully leave you; you just learn to live with it. I'm sure after the credits roll, Ryan and Naim will build the support system they need to stay alive. They will find people to stay by them when the other one can't. How the trauma hits them the most when they're alone. They will find resources and jobs that will accommodate them. They will learn to manage so their trauma doesn't rip their throats out.

However, the hauntings don't leave just because you leave your environment.

And so, this film ends on a bittersweet note.

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