Fung, C. K. M. (2025). Homophobic media or lesbian memories? Hong Kong queer women’ online debate over The First Girl I Loved. Continuum, 39(2), 363–375.
https://doi.org/10.1080/10304312.2025.2462102
ABSTRACT
Hong Kong cinema is known for producing bittersweet teenage lesbian stories, in which young lovers inevitably grow up to be married women leading heteronormative lives. The latest film to follow this tradition divided queer women upon its release. Some denounced The First Girl I Loved (2021) for perpetuating a dangerous and anachronistic stereotype, while others celebrated the film as a positive, faithful portrayal of lesbian memories. This paper challenges the view that LGBTQ+ films must be unilaterally transgressive or hegemonic, rather, I position this binary evaluation as part of queer audience’s own interpretive repertoire. By examining how viewers use terms such as ‘outdated’ and ‘authentic’ to describe the film, this study demonstrates that queer women are in fact debating the directors’ sexual-gender identities (what Foucault calls ‘the author function’) and the temporality of lesbian representations. Images of queer trauma can be read as homophobic to some while resonating with others, and by situating this tension within Hong Kong’s historical and political context, I argue that both readings are crucial strategies that Hong Kong women use to contest mainstream sexology and that the film helps them memorialize their lost gay youth online.
KEYWORDS:
Hong Kong, cinemapositive and negative representation, lesbian representation, queer girlhood, queer audience, author function, temporality, sexology, digital grief, online memorials
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