'Dreamboi' lives for the dolls

A DAY IN THE LIFE of a doll, according to Rodina Singh's Dreamboi: Wake up feeling like a chick in a harpy's nest. Hear yet another horrid news report about a sister who is ruthlessly slain for being trans. Punch in at work where the hateful lot constantly misgender and mistreat you. Develop gallstones over insecure coworkers who deny you entry to the women's toilet. So you skid down six flights of stairs to an unkempt basement toilet where, cautiously, you find respite. "How do you turn pain into something beautiful?" The graffitied walls ask on your descent.

All of this occurs in the first twenty minutes of the film, and it unravels in ways that lean into the absurdity of the daily oppressions that transpeople endure. Singh employs a feverish clash of colors, textures (both visual and auditory), and genres to underscore that—however frenetic or vibrant—existing in a world riddled with such transphobia is downright frightful, like...truly life-or-death scary. Viewers might find Singh's mix heady and her script didactic, but it's hard not to be taken by her film's immense, seemingly immovable conviction. It almost seeps out of the frame, seemingly asking, "You live for the dolls, but you won't let the dolls live?"

The clearest example of this comes from a long, uninterrupted shot of a young transwoman named Diwa (EJ Jarollina) descending to their building's dilapidated basement to relieve herself. She has to climb down because the government office where she works has effectively banned transwomen from using the women's toilet on their floor. And so she slinks down, certifiably horrified, to the B6 toilet, and Singh shows the full six minutes of her descent (call it a oner-to-boner, and leave Spielberg aghast!). There, she meets Dreamboi (Tony Labrusca), the pink-haired phantom of her wildest desires. Whether or not Dreamboi is physically there is uncertain, but Diwa takes it that he, too, comes there to commune with the same 'evils,' as she shudders at his every boyish moan and whimper.

Dreamboi places great importance on incorporeal spaces. Alter culture gives queer and trans people the means to safely navigate the desires vehemently demonized by society at large. For Diwa, a wholly imagined, extracorporeal rendezvous with an adult entertainer by way of ASMR feels infinitely more intimate than having physical relations and risking her life...literally. You see it manifest in Diwa's cautious body language even as Lilith (Jenn Rosa), presented by the film as the personification of all transwomen's desires, guides her hand to heed her body's yearning. When a boy (Migs Almendras) seems genuinely smitten by her, she skirts around the possibility rather than entertain it outright. It's a glum existence, and yet in Singh's world, they show their full lust for life, even out of something mundane, like a beautifully done press-on nail.

Singh seems perfectly aware that her work isn't without crassness. There are more gracious ways to open up these conversations, but that doesn't keep the film from having tender moments, too. During her talkback session at QCinema Pride, she shares that she doesn't know if she'll ever get another chance at telling a fully trans story, so to hell with avoiding sounding "preachy." I find this candor endearing. Who cares if a picture is painted with big strokes if it truly moves you? Dreamboi has plenty to say to anyone who's willing to listen (a lovely surprise, given that it premiered at last year's CineSilip, a film festival owned by Vivamax, the country's top softcore outfit), but in case it isn't yet clear, it's this: Live for the dolls, and let the dolls live.

Dreamboi

dir. Rodina Singh | 2025 | Drama | 3.5

A transwoman becomes entranced by the voice of an underground audio porn star. Torn between fantasy and reality, she drifts through the neon haze of Quezon City on a journey of desire, pain, and self-discovery.

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