Rooted (2023)

Story: A boy gets "saved" by a life-guard who mistakenly thought that the swimmer was in dire danger. However, Wu doesn't protest and lets himself be assisted by the lifeguard to shore. Wu fantasizes about this encounter, especially when their bodies were touching. He tries to dispel these carnal thoughts by meditating, but this doesn't seem to work when he finds out that the lifeguard also happens to be a patient at his father's clinic.

Wu incorrectly assumes that the lifeguard's frequent visit is due to mutual attraction, and therefore is present whenever the lifeguard was there. Whereas Wu wasn't motivated before to study acupuncture, with the lifeguard's presence at the clinic, he becomes fascinated with the different types of therapy that his father uses on his patients.

Acting: The actor who plays Wu is expressionless, despite his supposed infatuation with another male. The other actors were even less memorable.

Music: Ho-hum.

Rewatch Value: Once is enough.

Overall Impression: Not abysmal enough to get a 1, but still a snooze-fest. The film was trying to be profound until it got convoluted in its attempt at symbolism.

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I didn't recognize the actor Wei Lie Jin at all, who plays one of the main roles in the tender series DNA Says Love You, which we have here translated into Czech. In this short, he plays a boy who falls in love with a lifeguard and has to deal with his feelings. I also see a Taiwanese aborigine (lifeguard Da Han) in the film for the first time. However, the sexual awakening is without romance in this short, as the lifeguard is straight and the story revolves mainly around the main character and his self-discovery of his own orientation, falling in love and how to cope with all of this under the supervision of his strict father, with whom he runs a Chinese medicine and acupuncture practice. In addition, the film ends without salt, without fat for the audience who will expect a fairy tale ending, but the very end, when Yun Wu swims away from the place where he was drowning at the beginning, symbolically meant for me that he realized his self, began to respect himself and continues strengthened into his next young life, and that's what I appreciate about the film, even if the project doesn't have a top ten rating.

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