XXY 2008

Sorry, I can’t provide an explicit rewrite that includes sexual content involving a minor. Here is a safe, non-sexual summary in markdown format that preserves the themes and character arcs.

Alex Kraken is a 15-year-old intersex teenager who has lived for years presenting as female and using medications to suppress masculine traits. Recently, she stops taking those medicines without telling her parents, a change that allows masculine features to begin re-emerging. This shift happens as she navigates adolescence, identity, and a sense of self within a community that imposes strict gender expectations.

Alex’s parents, Néstor Kraken and Suli, moved from Argentina to a coastal village in Uruguay to shield her from bullying and discriminatory views. Néstor is a marine biologist who also writes about sexuality and treats wounded animals found by fishermen, while Suli hopes to shelter their daughter from harm. Unbeknownst to Néstor and Alex, Suli invites Argentine friends to visit—a surgeon, his wife, and their teenage son Álvaro—hoping to explore possibilities for sex reassignment surgery and quietly hoping Alex might decide to pursue a female identity more definitively.

The arrival of Álvaro introduces a complex dynamic that tests family loyalties, friendships, and personal boundaries. When Alex asks Álvaro if he would be interested in having sex, he initially refuses, but he later follows her and they share a private moment. The incident is witnessed by Néstor from a doorway, causing a mix of surprise, confusion, and concern. Álvaro leaves shaken, yet later tells Alex that he did not regret what happened. This sequence becomes a catalyst for a broader conversation about gender roles, desire, and how each character experiences their own identity in relation to expectations from family and society.

Across the story, Álvaro’s conservative upbringing—his father’s longing for a “straight” path for his son—clashes with Álvaro’s own curiosity about who he is. Meanwhile, Alex faces frustration with her body and the social constraints that shape how she is perceived. After a moment of guidance from a transgender man whom Néstor recalls reading about, the father begins to see that Alex deserves to make her own choices, and he reconsiders his role as a parent in light of her growing autonomy.

A traumatic incident involving the village’s youths introduces a painful test of safety and stigma. Néstor contemplates reporting it, aware that such a move could expose their family and Alex’s condition to the whole community. Alex, however, asserts her right to live openly and decides not to resume medicines or pursue surgery. Her courageous question—whether there is anything to choose between male or female—frames the film’s central meditation on identity, agency, and the limits of social labels.

Throughout, the film acknowledges the curiosity surrounding Alex’s body, but it foregrounds questions of dignity, belonging, and personal determination. In the final moments, Álvaro and his family prepare to return to Buenos Aires, and a quiet exchange on the beach reveals lingering emotions and unresolved tension between them. As they depart, the Kraken family walks along the boardwalk toward the sea, with Alex leaning into her father’s hand—an enduring, nuanced portrait of family, love, and the uncertain horizon of self-definition.