Illustrating Love and Acceptance with Fia Perera’s “Mermaid”

It’s no secret that the LGBTQ+ community has had its fair share of tough battles. They’ve been treated unfairly throughout all of American history and still are facing discrimination from local businesses to dehumanizing treatment from right-wing media outlets. Despite winning many victories, such as having same-sex marriage becoming fully legalized in 2015 thanks to the Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, their never-ending war for complete and total acceptance by their cisgender, straight peers is far from over. With the recent rise of anti-trans sentiment from the far-right, award-winning writer and director Fia Perera’s most recent film, Mermaid, tackles the very real issues the community continues to face.

Cassius Daniels (played by Devyn McDowell), or “Cassie,” identifies as a girl and dreams of nothing more than becoming a mermaid princess. But there’s one problem: she is trapped in the body of a ten-year-old boy with no way to express her true self. She experiences bullying from classmates at school while her father, Bill (played by Nat Faxon), is unaware of her inner turmoil. While attempting to take her own life via drowning, she is saved by Pepper (played by Arturo Luíz Soria), a depressed drag queen. Despite Pepper’s sharp tongue and snappy attitude, along with Cassie’s kleptomania, the two bond over their mutual personal struggles. However, Cassie doesn’t tell her father the truth; instead, she tells him that she’s hanging out with her friend Teddy. And things get muddy when Bill finally uncovers Cassie’s lie.

Even though Cassie’s fixation with mermaids stems from looking “cool, pretty, and weird in one package,” mermaids have also been used in film as an overt transgender allegory. Why is this the case? I think it’s because mermaids are half-fish and half-human, much like how some trans folk may see themselves. The original The Little Mermaid, along with its Disney adaptation, also highlights this with Princess Ariel’s metamorphosis from fantastical aquatic creature to regular human. In fact, there are plenty of parallels between Ariel and Cassie. Both feel unhappy and trapped in another body, and both undergo an emotionally challenging transition to become who they really are.

I’m no stranger to seeing a younger and older character bond over their shared traumas or struggles, because these struggles can be experienced at any age. But Fia Perera crafts a tear-jerking, beautiful narrative between two unlikely characters finding a deep sense of friendship and connection, concocting a unique blend of troubled innocence and jaded kindness. We see how happy Cassie feels when she’s finally found someone who understands her, but Pepper initially wants nothing to do with the kid. But deep down, he does what he can to help her through her struggles, because he knows exactly how he felt at her age. This is on full display when he offers for her to stay at his house when she adamantly refuses to go home to her traditional father. And even though he rebukes her statement that he’s her friend, it’s clear that he desperately needs true emotional connection. We see just how much they need each other when they harmonize “Heart and Soul” on piano.

This chemistry is strengthened by the earnest, profound, and heartfelt acting. It’s one thing to become your character, but it’s another thing entirely to channel that character through you. Devyn McDowell doesn’t become Cassie; they are Cassie. They perfectly channel their own struggles, passions, and desires to make Cassie feel like a complete and three-dimensional person, which makes you empathize with her struggles. Acting opposite of them is Arturo Luíz Soria, who brings a fiery, yet somber, and heavily nuanced performance as Pepper. He brings a warm, maternal light to Pepper that transcends previous portrayals of drag queens in film and TV while disproving all of the hateful right-wing rhetoric about drag queens “grooming and exploiting” children. This actually parallels the animal world, where same-sex couples (especially penguins and flamingos) will often adopt orphaned young and raise them as their own.

The use of color is used to symbolize Cassie’s emotional state. We frequently see her wearing a black hoodie and toque, grey skinny jeans, and a grey shirt when she’s either at home or school. While the color black is often used in film, comics, and TV to make a character seem edgy (such as Billy Butcher from The Boys or Kirito from Sword Art Online), it’s also used to illustrate depression, as Pixar’s Inside Out does with its main character, Riley. Cassie is almost always seen wearing her black hoodie around her dad and at school, showing us just how trapped she feels. It’s only through the halfway point that she begins wearing more colorful clothing after spending a lot of time around Pepper, who allows her to fully embrace her true self. And it’s here where we see her look and feel truly happy, like a huge weight has been lifted off her shoulders.

Likewise, Mermaid also utilizes fashion to highlight the contrast between queer-coded femininity, as seen with the mesh shirts, sparkly sequins, tight pants, and fabulous accessories, and the simple and traditional look associated with hegemonic masculinity. Both Bill and his friend, Carl, are cloaked like your typical “Midwestern bro” (I say this as a Midwesterner), complete with flannel shirts over a plain t-shirt, brown or black jackets, faded blue denim jeans, and baseball caps. I believe this fashion aesthetic was a deliberate choice to represent the prison that is masculinity. Men are expected to conform to societal norms by wearing plain, dull-colored clothing. If you shop around, you see the same, recycled designs in every department store: nondescript softshell jackets, desaturated pants, black or white undershirts, and boring sneakers or loafers. And this prison of masculinity only sows the seeds for toxic masculinity to rear its ugly head, which can be seen when Carl talks about kicking “certain people” out of the marina Bill manages, or uses demeaning and misogynistic language to describe beautiful women.

This is where we glimpse into Bill’s perspective. He wants the best for Cassie, but he doesn’t know his kid at all, despite being the only parent she has left. Bill simply dismisses Cassie’s gender dysphoria as “confusion” or “dangerous.” This is worsened when he takes Cassie to a “therapist” who not only prescribes her chlorpromazine (an antipsychotic used to treat people with schizophrenia) but also subjects Cassie to brutal conversion therapy. This is extremely harmful to children who are on the LGBTQ+ spectrum. As of 2024, 27 out of 50 states in America have banned gender reaffirming care to minors, with up to 40% of transgender minors residing in these states. But even more tragically, those who’ve experienced conversion therapy are five times more likely to attempt suicide or run away compared to those who don’t experience it. Despite having the right to marry, the LGBTQ+ community has a long way to go before they can be seen and treated as people.

It would be so easy to make a politically charged movie forcing transgender acceptance down our throats. But Fia Perera instead focuses her efforts on making the issue a humanist one at its core, because it is. I’ve seen many LGBTQ+ movies and movies with LGBTQ+ undertones, but none of them pushes the same boundaries as Mermaid does. Perera treats her characters as fully fleshed-out people who have their own wants, needs, and struggles, rather than paper-thin tokens to pander to the audience. She’s not only passionate about the struggles the community undergoes but can effortlessly convey this passion to the screen, painting a chaotically beautiful picture of a journey of self-discovery, gender identity, and finding genuine connection while combating hatred and derision with love and acceptance.