Thirteen or So Minutes

Lawrence Jefferies and Hugh Greerey have only just met. Both have histories with women; both would tell you without hesitation that they are straight. Thirteen or so minutes later, something has happened between them that neither man planned, and now they have to talk about it. Branden Blinn's short unfolds almost entirely in that conversation, as two men who have never questioned themselves stumble through embarrassment, curiosity and an unexpected tenderness, trying to name what they feel before the moment slips away. Nick Soper plays Lawrence and Carlos F. Salas is Hugh, and the film's real subject is the vulnerability that surfaces when the usual scripts about masculinity stop working. Premiering at the Honolulu Rainbow Film Festival in 2008, where it won a prize, the film became a widely shared favorite of the gay short-film circuit and remains a thoughtful, intimate study of attraction arriving without warning.