Cactus Flower by Seungah Yoo

This week’s Tin House Reels feature, Cactus Flower, portrays a love between two men whose relationship seems defined by a settling mutual calm. Although no dialogue is uttered, animator Seungha Yoo creates subtle changes in mood by scoring the film with the smallest interruptions of daily life: a coffee maker percolating, the scratch of a television set, the ocean at the shore. Despite his protagonists consistent emotional stillness, Yoo's film is far from unaffecting. Much like the work of Maira Kalman, Yoo sketches in a style that draws out meaning from the mundane acts of city life.