Crossing

Much better is the Canadian feature Crossing.

The title refers not to a life transition as might be expected, but to cross- dressing, the secret fantasy of otherwise straight, conventional Daniel.

His father exacts a death-bed promise from Daniel to take over the family business, which is low-level gangsterism, and make it respectable.

This is difficult for a man who spends much of his time dreaming of donning a garter belt and mascara.

Daniel is attacked in an alley by a kind of gender criminal a dyke with a huge scar on her face who somehow divines his secret, force-feminizing him at gunpoint: Say ˜I am Jennifer Kosinzski!�

Trying desperately to balance his normal� existence with an involvement with a blackmailing prostitute and her unsavoury friends, Daniel increasingly unravels.

In perhaps the film's most affecting scene, Daniel, still in makeup, talks unsparingly to the woman he thinks he loves, who is actually engineering his downfall, about the lure and terror of his fetish.

Crossing is a complex but never confusing thriller with a twist.

Solid performances, strong atmospherics, and a perverse streak that never panders make this fetish-fuelled drama a striking entry in the neo-noir genre.