An eventful New York City day in the life of Feña, a recently transitioned trans man (Lio Mehiel, an artist and filmmaker), is depicted with honesty, tenderness and wit in this Sundance U.S. Dramatic Competition entrant, a feature debut for Vuk Lungulov-Klotz.

Drawing on his own background as a child of Chilean and Serbian parents and his own experience of transition, Lugulov-Klotz adeptly distills a lot of complex thematic material around gender identity, queer lifestyles and ethnic intersectionality into one crisply folded package. The end result feels both authentic and accessible, and — thanks in part to the ensemble’s compelling performances, especially that of Mehiel — has potential to cross over from the arthouse/festival circuit and reach viewers further afield, especially through a streaming service.

In his mid-20s, Feña, whose birth name is Fernanda, has recently started using testosterone and had top surgery. So with his square jaw and punky faux-hawk of dark curls, some strangers immediately identify him as male (mostly men), while other interlocutors gender him as female, to his annoyance. Either way, Feña isn’t hung up on passing as male all the time, and is out enough about his transition to bring it up in an argument with a bank clerk while cashing a paycheck made out to his dead name.

At the same time, he’s protective about his privacy, and bridles in an early scene when Jenny, a coked-up young woman (Sarah Herrman) in a night club, asks him if he has a penis (he doesn’t, but that’s not a question she should ask, he explains). And no, that lack doesn’t mean he’s not a “real man.” 

As it happens, Jenny is the cousin of John (Cole Doman), Feña’s ex-boyfriend who is as not-over Feña as Feña is over him. Over the course of the film, it becomes clear that they had a very messy split around the time Feña came out as trans. Nevertheless, they’re still both attracted to one another in a fundamental way. Once cousin Jenny is sent back to New Jersey, they end up in bed together. In the morning, both seem unsure if last night was the end of the old thing or the beginning of something new, a feeling anybody who has ever slept with an ex can relate to. 

However, Feña doesn’t have time to dwell on this because he has a lot to do today in preparation for the arrival of his father, Pablo (Alejandro Goic), later that night, coming to visit from Chile. Determined to prove that he’s “not a fuck-up” who can’t make good on his promise to pick up Pablo from the airport, Feña is compelled to scramble when the friend who was going to lend him a car for the evening lets him down.

While stopping off at the restaurant where he works to pick up that aforementioned paycheck, Feña finds his 14-year-old half-sister Zoe (MiMi Ryder, excellent) has skipped school that day and needs some support. Dialogue makes it clear that Feña has been estranged from her and Zoe’s shared mother (Lisa Knightly, just seen), possibly because of disagreement over Feña’s transition. 

That said, Lungulov-Klotz’s script doesn’t let its hero off with blaming all his rocky relationships on other people’s transphobia. At one point during an argument, John drops a cruel truth bomb when he tells Feña “people don’t hate you because you’re trans; they hate you because you’re an asshole.” Actions speak even louder than words when we see Feña constantly mooching favors from friends, messing up and pushing people away before they have a chance to reject him. In one delicious moment, Zoe slaps down Feña’s assumptions that she’ll be freaked out over her sibling’s trans status when Zoe says effectively, duh, she knows, she has a friend at school who’s trans, it’s no big deal. Make that score 1-0 for Gen Z. 

Unsurprisingly, the older Pablo is less at ease with his kid’s change, but even that confrontation is handled with sensitivity. Pablo is clearly grieving for the little girl he once knew, and coping with guilt over having been absent so long from Feña’s life. But he wants to make a connection with his child if only Feña will let him. 

Clearly striving for the most authentic, naturalistic effect he can get, Vuk Lungulov-Klotz and his team go for unobtrusive production values, with very little non-source music, easy rhythms courtesy of editor Adam Dicterow and warmly lit cinematography by Matthew Pothier that fluidly dances in and around the cast.

Mehiel’s performance in particular is so grounding, expressive and compelling to watch that the film doesn’t need any other bells and whistles — long shots of their face say everything Feña struggles to express.