Ira Sachs

Three generations grappling with a life-changing experience during one day of a vacation in Sintra, Portugal, a historic town known for its dense gardens and fairy-tale villas and palaces.

In Memphis, a middle-class white teenager and a black Vietnamese immigrant meet in a gay cruising spot and discover what they don't have in common. Lincoln, who's not yet 18, leads a straight life most of the time: he has a girl friend, goes to dances, jokes with guys. But he also has a secret life, in which he's drawn to dark places where he has sex with men he doesn't know. One night, while visiting a gay video arcade, he connects with John, a Vietnamese-born gay man, in his 20s probably, whose father was an African-American US soldier. John invites Lincoln to spend some carefree time with him, and Lincoln takes him to his father's boat. John then convinces Lincoln to take the boat into the Mississippi delta, where setting off some fireworks out of season precipitates betrayal and revenge. —<jhailey@hotmail.com>