In their almighty highs, and earth-shattering lows, relationships transform through the relationships we maintain with ourselves, as much as with one another. Navigated through periods of change and instability, the equilibrium between two people – their individual experiences entwined – relies upon careful considerations from each side, the combined impression of which preserves the whole.

In short film My Dear Boy, Kauai-raised, New York-based writer/director Leaf Lieber opens up the bond between two people and the cataclysmic moments that threaten to destabilize it. Exploring love lost through the psychological journey of one half of its central couple, the film aims to visualize the means of catharsis through which the breakdown of relationships can be processed – with reasoning found in the volatility and seismic shifts that contribute to their downfall.

Premiered at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival as part of the LGBTQIA+ Shorts Program: SEE ME, FEEL ME, curated by Lucy Murkerjee, My Dear Boy threads themes of grief and transformation into an exploration of queer connections that intersects fantasy and reality. Starring real-life partners, Juan Cortes and Tyler Givens, the film stands as a cinematic reflection of how processing pain attached to those who enter and depart our lives can bring about transformation. Centering the narrative within his own realm of experience, Lieber takes a semi-autobiographical journey through the continual fluctuations trodden by human relationships, feeding past heartbreak and periods of self-questioning into an open letter of forgiveness and gratitude – and his own form of creative closure.