All The Men I Met But Never Dated
Mainstream English language cinema – in both the feature and short film variety – rarely centres on Muslim lives and stories. It’s even rarer to see a queer image of Muslim life uplifted on screen.
Closeted queer Pakistani finds tender loving in the gym, in a short movie with a taste of more to come - from the Woodstock Film Festival
Mainstream English language cinema – in both the feature and short film variety – rarely centres on Muslim lives and stories. It’s even rarer to see a queer image of Muslim life uplifted on screen. All the Men I Met but Never Dated, the autobiographical short from Pakistani-American Muneeb Hassan, does just that. That’s something for which we should be grateful.
Ali (Ahmed Shihab-Eldin) spots a shirtless Oliver (Jared P-Smith) at the gym, who is so nice to look at that he wants a longer and closer view. The two go on a few dates, shown as a montage, before the fast-forwarding stops for their fourth date. That’s when Oliver pieces together that Ali has never come out of the closet to his family (and doesn’t show any intentions to). “I can’t be someone’s secret” he says, as friendly as possible, initiating their break-up. The most substantial scene in the brief 10 minutes is a sit-down conversation between the two men circling the complexities of love, familial responsibility, and cultural expectations as Ali voices his desire to keep his sexuality from his family.
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