Great acting, great relationship development. My main conflict is with the ending. This is what I usually see in gay films:
1. Two guys have intimate relations. One man is very closeted, straight-identifying, and homophobic. While the other is more accepting of the idea of being gay
2. The more accepting guy starts to fall in love and wants more intimacy. While the homophobic guy feels shame and regret, and gets angry when the other guy pushes for more
3. They might mess around a few more times, but something comes to a head (usually someone finds out) and the homophobic guy freaks out and denounces their relationship
4. The homophobic guy moves on, dates a woman, basically continues his whole life living mostly contentedly as a "straight" man, completely leaving the other guy behind. The more accepting guy is left miserable, pining after the homophobic guy
"Mario" was a little different in that it flipped the narrative of point 4. Instead of the openly gay guy left pining after the homophobe who moves on to marry a woman, it's the homophobe whose left pining after the openly gay guy, who moved on with another man. So the message seemed to change from "it's miserable to be openly gay, the guy you fall in love with will be ashamed and leave you" to "it's miserable to be closeted, you're better off staying with the man who loves you instead of pretending to be straight"
So I liked that element of it. On the other hand, it did of course perpetuate the inevitable trope of gay men ending up miserable and not being able to have a happy ending.
1. Two guys have intimate relations. One man is very closeted, straight-identifying, and homophobic. While the other is more accepting of the idea of being gay
2. The more accepting guy starts to fall in love and wants more intimacy. While the homophobic guy feels shame and regret, and gets angry when the other guy pushes for more
3. They might mess around a few more times, but something comes to a head (usually someone finds out) and the homophobic guy freaks out and denounces their relationship
4. The homophobic guy moves on, dates a woman, basically continues his whole life living mostly contentedly as a "straight" man, completely leaving the other guy behind. The more accepting guy is left miserable, pining after the homophobic guy
"Mario" was a little different in that it flipped the narrative of point 4. Instead of the openly gay guy left pining after the homophobe who moves on to marry a woman, it's the homophobe whose left pining after the openly gay guy, who moved on with another man. So the message seemed to change from "it's miserable to be openly gay, the guy you fall in love with will be ashamed and leave you" to "it's miserable to be closeted, you're better off staying with the man who loves you instead of pretending to be straight"
So I liked that element of it. On the other hand, it did of course perpetuate the inevitable trope of gay men ending up miserable and not being able to have a happy ending.