Movie Reviews -
Gay Themed

I had recently reviewed another one of rugby player Gareth Thomas' documentary. This one, I guess came in sometime after that. In this emotional and hard-hitting documentary he finally goes public about his condition and reveals how hiding the truth about his health left him feeling depressed and contemplating taking his own life. With the help of family, friends, medical experts and others with HIV, he sets about tackling the stigmas, myths and misunderstandings surrounding the condition. The documentary starts by Gareth making the news of him being HIV positive in a video to publicly announce it. Not sure if awareness was the motivation, but the idea for him is to change perceptions about HIV by raising awareness & fighting prejudice. He re-educates himself and the audience through interviews with doctors and other health workers that these days HIV is nothing to be afraid of and people can live almost as normal a life as anyone else. In fact, if he continues to take his medi...

There are plenty of films that I have already seen which talk about a few church priests taking advantage of young boys and the aftermath of that many years later. This subject has been presented in movies format, short films and commentaries. But sadly there are so many cases all around this subject, that I keep finding out about more and more new stuff. This is one such film that chooses to describe itself as a fiction based on known facts. It shows how grown men who had been abused by Father Preynat as young boys courageously decided to take action by bringing charges. The scale of the abuse is staggering, and there’s an explanation; the Church knew of the abuse and rather than stop it, they covered it up, allowing it to continue. The film is almost episodic where it focuses on three of its central characters, who are introduced to us through their distinctive narratives. The first is Alexandre, a well-to-do media advisor with five kids, a wife, and a beautiful home. He’s only recen...

Ex-Wales rugby star Gareth Thomas came out as gay in 2009 after hiding his sexuality for years. He admitted it almost drove him to suicide after his wife Jemma left him when he told her the truth. Thomas said unless homophobia in football was "policed as stringently as racism is policed, then it will always be a problem". The former Cardiff Blues player looked at the issue in a documentary for BBC Wales. When Thomas was assaulted because of his sexuality, he has been seeking to include homophobic abuse in the 1991 Football Offences Act so it is dealt with in the same way as racism on the pitch. While he had already been lobbying for the change for years, he said the assault made him realise quite how harmful hate speech can be and it further spurred him on. The documentary starts with him trying to get an idea of history of using gay abuses and hurls towards both players and fans and how it was always considered ok and non-offensive. But times have changed. He goes into locke...

This documentary film following one survivor and his lawyer as they pursue justice through a public trial focusing on one perpetrator in particular, Father William Hodgson "Hod" Marshall, a retired priest and teacher, who several years ago pleaded guilty to sexually abusing 16 boys and one girl at schools in Toronto, Sudbury and Windsor. What distinguished the case was that the defendant was seeking punitive damages, for the first time in Canada, from a Church institution. The crux of the matter was that Marshall’s crimes had been reported a half-dozen times over the years, yet he was allowed to continue working, and abusing students. Most of the documentary focuses on the lawyer and the one survivor Rod MacLeod going through deliberations and how they want to have the church pay for what they did. They are both aware of plenty other situations where the church did out of court settlements but Rod wanted none of it. The doc takes us through the journey of the lawyer preparing...

This film made no sense at all, and not because it is a musical. We will talk about that later but the script was so flimsy thin (if there was even a script). I watched and watched trying to make sense of what was going on but the characters kept coming in and out singing their heart out for what, I have no idea. If you do not believe me, read the synopsis summary below and let me know what you think. Peter, a freudian psychiatrist married to a Finnish actor, David, a young British gay living in Banyoles, addicted to Grinder, and Coco Lamour, a Parisian French actress. Peter is a friend of Maria, also a Freudian psychiatrist, and Betsy, David's mother, living in Cadaqués. Maria prepares a trip to spend some days with Betsy. David works at a computer company in Girona directed by a very talented young Indian, Usha. David has a great crisis with his partner, Daniel, a Mallorcan living in Barcelona. Albert is a famous British writer retired in Begur passing the mourning for the loss o...

This documentary is about the life of the Brazilian transsexual singer Linn da Quebrada. Coming from an impoverished region of São Paulo, where she has to face many prejudices, among others, for being black. Her funk music sounds like a "gun" against machismo. With a really strong and daring stage presence, she constantly seeks to confront and fight paradigms and stereotypes. The titular star and her stage partner Jup do Bairro openly discuss what challenges they face from transphobia and racism growing up in the favelas of San Paulo, exploring how they use their music to give voice to the marginalized communities they fight for. The film shows her in performance, in the studio, reflecting on the nature of identity, hanging out with friends, and also affectionately chatting with her mum in the apartment where she grew up, arguing about the community’s defeatist habit of romanticizing poverty. She aligns the experience of being trans with the marginalization involved in having...

I cant believe. This came out in 2019. A YouTube Premium original series with 6 episodes. Weird City is set in the near future in the city of Weird, which has been physically divided into two halves and segregated by economic class: Above The Line, populated by Haves, and Below The Line, populated by Have-Nots. Each episode follows different individuals as they navigate life in the city. I will be reviewing here only the first episode out of 6 since it was the only gay themed one in this anthology series. This episode is called "The One". We meet Stu, a young man born Below the Line. However, when his mother invented a hot app, he was able to move Above the Line. Now there is one problem. People born Above the Line are assigned mates at birth under specific regulations. Since Stu didn’t move Above the Line until he was older, he was never assigned anyone and has found dating tough. A friend at bar tells him about this company called “The One That’s The One.” This is a company...

Trade is a dark love story that focuses on self-identity, exploration and one's fight for acceptance, which hits home with so many individuals today who fear from the backlash of being gay or transgender. It shows us the story of two men, one a streetwise hustler, the other a straight-laced lawyer, who meet and form a relationship that brings to light who they really are. ON paper the idea sounds good, but the biggest problem of the film is that the director doesn't know when to cut a particular scene. Some scenes in the film go on and on, while other's do not get proper closure. More on that later.  Shawn is a black gay man, who works on the street as a trans hustler Coco. He lives with his aunt. Then we meet Michael, a man married for 10 years, whose wive desperately wants to have a child, who is rich and a successful lawyer, but he has been hiding his identity of being gay and wanting to dress up as a female. The two have a chance encounter when Shawn is being harassed b...

Intersex is a topic that I snot often discussed and we really haven't seen much content about it. After all, it is a tricky subject. As it is, adolescence can be rough, regardless of your background or current circumstances, and on top of that if you have to spend time figuring out your gender, that could likely lead to a lot of therapy sessions, awkward moments and uncomfortable conversations. This film is story of one such teenager Adam, who is raised as a boy and how things change when he gets his first period. Adam, born with both male and female genitals was raised as a boy. He is a touch cookie who picks up fights with classmates if they bully him. This secret is only known to the family but hasn't bothered anyone till now. But things start to get complicated when he first falls for a new transfer in his school, and then immediately gets his first period. His parents consult a specialist doctor, who does some tests and it is confirmed that Adam has equal amount of both fe...

This indie feel film could have been so much more. But even in its almost 2 hours of run time, it takes forever to come to the point. The film is about a man in his early 30s discovering things about his sexuality, something we have seen plenty of time before. Is he bored, is he lonely, is he scared of relationship - there is no deep exploration of any of that. Sure love can hot you anytime, but what was it that this film was trying to say? The story is straight forward. Ryan, a man in his 30's works from home mostly and has a roommate. He is consumed by loneliness, living an uneventful life with a dull job that just about passes the time. Ryan is secretly struggling with his sexuality and finding comfort in online encounters with men, usually on video and never in person. At a birthday party for his friend Brad, Ryan meets Brad’s boyfriend Sam and the two hit it off. Ryan and Brad quickly become close and before either of them realizes it, they start having an affair. The next hal...

This intriguing documentary is a very affectionate profile of Brazil’s growing  gay leather community. Through a quick backstory and a highly amusing parody, we find how Barbudo became the very first winner of the Mr Leather title in 2017, and now the de-facto organiser of the second ever competition that is the subject of the film. The film maker uses an expressionistic approach to tackle the subject, making it quite different from a typical documentary. Thirteen years ago when the mysterious Mr D started the first leather night in Sao Paolo only one other person turned up.  Barbudo.  Now it is one of the most important leather parties in the country. It's time for the second competition in 2019 and we have 4 contestants. The documentary trails the four contestants vying for the title we  get the feeling that this is still quite an intimate affair where everyone knows everyone else. At the Leather Dinner that precedes the competition everyone is decked out in their ...

The documentary tries to build a timeline of Black queer activism in Toronto. Opening with a canonical scene of the disruptive strength of the women-led Black Lives Matter sit-in at the 2016 Toronto Pride Parade event, the documentary flashes back to the lesser-known beginnings of black queer resistance and gives us an opportunity to widen our understanding of the roots of the Black Lives Matter movement in Toronto. Our Dance of Revolution begins in the '80s at 101 Dewson Street. During that decade, writer/activist Makeda Silvera and her partner at the time turned the house into a collective residence for queer folks. Against the backdrop of the feminist movement, protests against police violence, the bathhouse raids and the rise of the AIDS epidemic, this collective of mostly queer women organized, worked, lived, loved and partied together. It became the birthplace for groups such as Lesbians of Colour (LOC) and Zami (the first Canadian group for Black Caribbean queer people). We ...

I am really surprised that despite this show having come a couple of years ago, I had not heard of it till very recently. An indie-made sitcom about a longtime gay couple who can’t stand each other and spend virtually every minute of screen time saying so in the most hateful ways possible, sounded fun to watch. In fact, I thought it may end up being like Vicious, one of my fav sitcoms from UK. Over two seasons of 7 and 8 episodes each, the best thing is this is short n short story format of anywhere 5-10 minutes, so it's a very easy breezy watch. Ralph and Randy have ben a couple for forever now. Ralph is a needy romantic still clinging to his fantasy of a happy-ever-after marriage, while Randy is a vain and unapologetically shallow serial cheater who eagerly jumps at any opportunity to spit venom at his nebbish-y spouse. To call their relationship dysfunctional would be putting it lightly, for example they even get turned on the they physically and verbally start to fight; leading...

Greta is a very interesting film in more than one way.  The film gives us a very compassionate view on people willing to try be in love against all odds - their own convictions notwithstanding. Looking at marginalization through several lenses; including age, sexuality, gender and criminal life; this is a thematically ambitious but narratively very intimate and compassionate story of human relationships. Gay nurse Pedro is way past his retirement age but still goes to hospital everyday and takes pleasure in taking care of others. One night, his trans friend Daniela, who suffers form kidney failure, needs emergency bed in the hospital. But since doctors wont allow her in female ward , she doesn't want to go in the men's ward, which is the only place with some vacancy. So when a bloodied stranger is brought in at the hospital under suspicious circumstances, the supposedly morally upright Pedro helps to smuggle out the man who might be a criminal on the run from either a gang or t...

This documentary of under an hour explores touch based service businesses including cuddling, erotic massage, sex surrogacy and sex work. Some people venture into this line of work as a side hustle, despite having another full time job and for others this is their full time job. Like it goes for many documentary styles, we meet 4-5 folks who fall in this category and who for various reasons are into the business of providing these services.  We meet a cuddle expert, who talk sabot how he wasn't also aware of this service but now he gets clients who like this but the guy also emphasized on the importance of consent. We do overlook how little touch we get every day. And how it can be emotionally taxing as well trying to look for someone to be intimate with -- so hiring someone just makes a lot of sense. There is another guy who talks about how he provides mostly BDSM massage services and how he gets repeated clients and there is something there that he fulfills desires of his clients...

In 2011, the U.S. repealed its discriminatory “don't ask, don’t tell” policy, which banned gay, lesbian, and bisexual service members from serving openly in the military. That reversal, however, didn’t include transgender people, 15,500 of which are estimated to be serving in the military today. This documentary film chronicles the stories of four transgender service members fighting for their right to serve openly. Following one couple and two others across several years, TransMilitary captures their long journey to meet with the Pentagon’s top brass with the goal of igniting dialogue that will reverse the ban. Staff Sergeant Logan Ireland loves serving in the dangerous Kandahar province in Afghanistan. When the film opens, his fellow troops don’t know he’s trans. As he says, “What I like about the deployment is I can be my authentic self,” including growing a wispy mustache. His scratchy mustache is an issue for his girlfriend Laila, an Army Corporal. Her family had a difficult...

Metro Sexual is an Aussie mockumentary comedy following the doctors Steph (lesbian) and Langdon (gay), who work at Metropolitan Sexual Health. As per the show's creator and actor also playing Langdon, the show is the story of the doctors, the staff and the patients in an inner-city Melbourne sexual health clinic and all the unknown struggles that these doctors sometimes face. Spread across 8 episodes in the first season, the exiles are about an average 10 minutes each. Over the course of these 8 episodes, the doctor duo takes us through the various STIs possibilities out there with their own quick ways. Langdon is the ultimate enthusiast, he's always coming up with 101 ideas to promote their little sexual health clinic. Whereas Steph is the typical prank player, who doesn't leave any opportunity to embarrass Langdon. The different episodes focus on different sexual issues like syphillis, cervical screening, crabs outbreak in a retirement community, a celebrity RJ, tough bik...

The Danish Boys is a new short film collection. Featuring 5 shorts from Danish directors to watch, the release showcases rising talent in front of and behind the camera. Each short tells a very different but compelling story, giving glimpses into the lives of young gay men living in Denmark. Hotel Boy Young Samir accompanies a politician Stefan to a hotel room. Samir is ready to abandon his life and go all in with Stefan, thinking that his politician lover is ready to give up his family and live as an out gay man. What starts off as an excited hook-up soon turns into an argument as Samir realises that he had read far more into his relationship than he should have done. It captures the feeling of being young and in love, unable to see what’s pretty clearly right in front of you. Poz Now this was a weird short film. A troubled young man Oliver is searching for a solution to his problems and a way to ensure his sister's continued support. He ventures in a destructive path, where he sl...

People Like Us is a poignant reflection and insightful look at being gay in Singapore, following the lives of four gay men in Singapore as they navigate life and relationships. The series is raw and telling, never shying away from controversial topics while being respectful of the subjects addressed. There are 2 seasons, each with 6 episodes of about 7-8 minutes each. Singapore does have a weird standing where legally gay men have no rights, yet the city-state does have a very active, gay community.  We meet 4 gay men based in Singapore. Joel has been looking for love but somehow all his ex's left him after sometime. He meets Ridzwan, a Malay origin muslim guy who is in closet. Something about. Him attracts Joel and he pursues him relentlessly till he agrees to go out. Before you realize they begin to like each other, but the conflict arises mostly due to Ridzwan not being out. We then have a 20-something old Indian origin army recruit who is constantly on Grindr looking for Mr. Ri...

I think I have reviewed more than a few reviews on various documentaries and even films on the whole America's fascination of conversion therapy. This documentary is surprisingly a neutral look at sexual orientation conversion therapy. As a result, you get an in inkling of the conservative notion that modern mindset stresses tolerance except for tolerance of religion and traditional values. Conversion therapy is the controversial, non-scientifically based process which aims to convert an individual's sexual orientation from homosexual to heterosexual. Although it has been discredited by all major American medical, psychiatric, psychological and professional counseling organizations, some therapists still offer the service for reasons almost exclusively rooted in a conservative religious belief system. We follow Nathan, a gay man in his late twenties, as he seeks counseling from a conversion therapist Christopher Doyle, a (self-proclaimed) formerly gay man who is now married wit...