Mutt screens at the 2024 QueerScreen’s 31st Mardi Gras Film Festival on February 20 2024.
A mutt is typically associated with a mixed-breed dog. Used as a synonym for mongrel; they can be untethered from an ascribed identity or label. In Vuk Lungulov-Klotz’s debut feature film, the mutt in question happens to be protagonist Feña (Lio Mehiel) – a young, scattered, and irritable trans man of mixed ethnicity. Taking place over a twenty-four-hour period, Mutt is an up close and stressful portrait of recent post-transition life.
Mutt is a story of frustration, survival, and cascading reconnection. A day where Feña is reunited with his ex-boyfriend, his sister, and his father – all of whom who haven’t seen him post transition. It’s also a day of true exhaustion, wherein transphobia is rife and Feña is wary of how he will be perceived. A single day can be emblematic of a lifetime.
The film begins with a slow and creeping zoom in on Feña’s face. He’s trying to keep up a smile while socialising at a nightclub while waiting on a call from his father, Pablo (Alejandro Goic). Feña briefly exits the club to organise Pablo’s transportation into New York. Pablo is concerned he won’t know what Feña looks like. Feña simply replies, “I look like me.” A stranger in the street thinks it’s okay to tell Feña he speaks “nice Spanglish.” Written from the perspective of a Chilean and Serbian trans director – Lungulov-Klotz highlights the real world of microaggressions and complexities for gender and ethnically diverse people.
Lio Mehiel is not playing the character with a stereotypical predilection for conflict, he brushes off what he can. Feña returns to the club and finds that his straight ex-boyfriend John (Cole Doman) is there. John has returned to NYC to nurse his ailing mother after he and Feña went through a breakup a year earlier. John and Feña still have chemistry but they also have a level of antagonism toward each other. Feña’s feelings are conflicted as are John’s. A night of conversation leads to sex. John seems more preoccupied with body transformation than caring about a man who’s just discovered himself. Feña is too abrasive to give John time to process who he has always been but is only recently expressing physically.
Feña’s day is a mess. Partly is through circumstances he cannot control, but also because he is making questionable decisions. Feña’s teenage half-sister, Zoe (MiMi Ryder) abruptly turns up skipping school. Feña hasn’t seen Zoe in over a year. Both Feña and Zoe have been hurt by their substance addicted mother, Lori. Lori refused to acknowledge Feña’s transition and closed her home to him. Lori’s temper is causing Zoe to be neglected and without a nurturing family. Zoe writes her phone number on Fena’s arm, a symbol of hope for both siblings going forward.
There are Olympian-level hurdles to get to Pablo at the airport. Feña can’t get money out because a cheque is written in his deadname – the bank teller ignores his explanation, invalidates him, and still calls him ‘ma’am’. Feña loses his phone, struggles to find a car, trips on the subway, and is shamed for asking for the morning after pill from a pharmacist. Friends flake on him. Yet, people also turn up for him in surprising ways.
The primary place where Mutt might lose some audiences is the twenty-four-hour contrivance. Mutt asks the audience to suspend disbelief that so many people from Feña’s past can manifest so rapidly. Yet, the film creates tension by building a complex, lived in world where post-transition is captured with frenetic intensity.
The performance by Lio Mehiel is captured with his authentic voice. Getting a trans-masculine actor to portray a character with such complexity brings a layer of depth. He balances being angry, empathetic, and determined, dancing around the social boundaries of transphobia with precise ease. Even when some moments feel too drawn out, Mehiel is there to make everything feel captivating once again.
The strongest moment in Mutt is when Feña and Pablo finally have time to reconcile. While Feña is desperate for his father to believe what he is going through is ‘beyond a phase’. Pablo at first finds it all too confusing. Many trans people must remind their loved ones that what they’re going through is not a choice, and only some are lucky enough to have that sentiment heard and respected. Mutt leaves us with the positive reminder that loved ones of the past can become loved ones of the present.
A father and son can reminisce about finding solace listening to the rain and a sister can see her brother for exactly who he is. Feña should be able to live his life without explanation. Mutt is sometimes overly chaotic, but inside that chaos is a reminder why we need to support and be supported by family. Especially so in a society which often seeks to erase a person’s humanity because they don’t want to understand their identity.
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Director: Vuk Lungulov-Klotz
Cast: Lio Mehiel, Cole Doman, MiMi Ryder
Writer: Vuk Lungulov-Klotz
