#double mints

2. These boys are NOT NORMAL about it

There is no part of their relationship that is good or healthy. Neither of them can make positive choices when the other is around. This is pure uncut mutual obsession. That's why it's so fucking hot.

Moreover, they have been Not Normal about one another since they were in high school. You get to watch two adolescents with compatible psychosexual trauma develop kinks in real time. Will there be collateral damage? You bet your ass there'll be.

One of my favorite fictional pair tropes is when the one who looks like the hapless normie is actually the bigger psycho. Yep.

Maybe you don't want to watch two handsome men erotically destroy themselves and each other? I dunno, couldn't be me.

3. The cinematography, though?

So much of the (very little) discussion I've seen about this movie involved the words "low budget". The first time I saw someone call it that, it caught my by surprise, because at no point while watching it did I think about how cheaply it was made.

And yet it's absolutely true! This is not an expensive film. It has a dozen or so speaking roles and no big sets. I bet the biggest single expense was renting that fishing boat for the end.

It's so lovely, though. It's got a good eye that really gets across the weird, intense pitch of the relationship. The violence is awful, but still kind of pretty. It's all shot in a way that's bloody but not gory, if you know the difference. There's a really brutal scene a little past the hour mark, and it's extremely telegraphed, so you can close your eyes if you want -- but man, despite being pretty squeamish about violence, I can't look away. It is the most intense that Japanese law will allow a man to be while eating fruit.

There. That's my favorite shot in the whole movie. If that one doesn't convince you to watch it, I don't know what will.

4. There's a manga!

The movie is a relatively faithful adaptation of a short (only 4.5 chapters!) manga, so if you're sad when the final credits start to roll, don't be! You can read all about it!

Honestly, I think the movie tells the story better, since the manga is episodic to the point of being incoherent at times, and the movie adds material that cushions a lot of the roughness. Still, I think the manga's worth a read. If nothing else, it's way more pornographic. You can find the whole thing translated at MangaDex.

5. I think you'll like the ending

It's always hard to stick the dismount in one of these, right? Like, you kind of want them to go off and live happily ever after, except you know that if they did that, the movie would suck, so you're braced for it all to end in bloody tragedy, but you don't want that bloody tragedy to feel cheap or unearned, but you really don't want avoiding that bloody tragedy to feel cheap or unearned.... It's a lot to negotiate in terms of viewer expectations, is all I'm saying.

The best of this genre hit the right balance, with ends that feel like they match the rest of their movies. The end of Double Mints feels like it matches the rest of the movie. It competently threads a very complicated needle. In short: I liked it. And I think you may like it too.

Feeling the obsession?

GagaOOLala has it for you! You'll need an account, but you may not need a paid account -- and really, if you're into gay shit from around the world, you should have an account already. I also saw it uploaded to a couple DailyMotion accounts, so you can try it that way too.

I didn't really notice until I started putting this rec post together that from some angles, Fuchikami Yasushi kind of looks like Markiplier. How about that.