Movie Reviews -
Gay Themed

My Dear is a self-reflective documentary about the will of a young Chinese director Yao to express his own sexual identity in Europe. Shifting between observational footage, paper puppetry, and poetic symbolism, he explores expressions of sexual identity in this essay about queerness, immigration, and performance. (A question I have is, since Yao was living in Budapest, why is the country of origin shown as Portugal?) Yao, a Chinese national, is nearing the end of his two year European college education.  Yet the 26-year-old is reluctant to return to China because he is already being pressured by his parents to come back home, get married and have kids. This closeted gay man has been in a relationship with Asim, a gay Iranian living in China for almost 6 years now, but no one in China knows this. He thought that coming to Europe would liberate him but now that he is finishing studies and finding a job is becoming increasingly hard, choices for him are minimal. He realizes that mayb...

A queer homoerotic musical fantasy mixing climate change, anti-royals politics and a lot of firemen fetish. I have to say that this, just under 70 minute film, was quite fun to watch. It debuted in Cannes film festival. Made at obviously a very small budget, in its own unique way, the film entertains us and gives us a message but also stays a bit flirty and naughty. Starting in the year 2069 (wink wink), the crown less King Alfredo of Portugal is on his death bed and shining back of his life. The film goes in flashback, where Prince Alfred is a young man, who is troubled by the wildfires sweeping the country.Against his parents wishes, he announces he wants to be a fireman. “Don’t confuse the royal family with documentary cinema!” his mother chides. Nevertheless, he joins and he meets Alfonso, who is assigned his buddy. The handsome black man and young prince feel sparks. Before long, desire is kindled between the two men when Alfredo must practice his mouth-to-mouth resuscitation tech...

I would call this film more of an arthouse film in the LGBT genre. The film doesn't judge you for your sexuality, in fact it keeps it fluid, without asking or providing for labels. The film is more about friendship, love and issues that we all have in our lives and the past we can't bury and the future we wanna get. Four friends are spending a relaxed weekend in a summer house: Francisco owns the villa and is supposedly straight (or bi), who is with Joanna. Joanna is best friends with Simao, a screen writer, secretly writing his next film on the lives of himself and his friends and finally Vasco, a romantic at heart who doesn't believe in hook-ups and has been in an online relationship with  married man, who hasn't met him yet. In morning, they are all surprised to individually have received a call from an old friend David, who is in town and wants to visit them all. We gradually learn about their reasons for being excited and/or scared by his announced visit. Davi...

So, I did not know anything about the film when I started watching it. It felt as if it seems like a true story, a biopic of sorts, with scenes moving along at a fast paced. It felt, as audience we were supposed to know the context of the area and the times. Thirty minutes into the film, I decided that I need to read a little bit more about the film before I continue to watch. And I am happy I did that because suddenly the film started making a lot more sense. Al Berto is one of Portugal’s best-known poets and the film focuses on his youth immediately after the Portuguese revolution of 1974. in 1975, Al Berto decided to return to his childhood town of Sines as his base to become a writer after spending time in Brussels. He stays in his family mansion which was seized by authorities during revolution and is now empty. Once there, he starts befriending like-minded individuals who are into poets, arts, eccentricity and sexuality. He meets João Maria and the two men have an instant co...

How I wanted to like this film. The poster of the film looks nice and the premise seemed interesting as well but unfortunately the film went from being stupid to getting stupider as time went by. It was just so odd with everything that was happening. Some people (read film makers), may term this as dark comedy or something, but I for a change did not get any laughs on any scene. João & Carlos have been together for 5 years. One morning João wakes up not remembering he is gay and freaks out seeing Carlos in bed naked with him. He is disoriented and thinks that everyone around him(his sister, his parents, his publisher) have all gone crazy and they are trying to make him gay. João is a celebrated writer and is soon supposed to finish his first gay-themed book but is not stuck in last chapter which becomes difficult to finish now, since he can’t even remember that he is gay. His competitor Isabella on the other hand has announced the launch of her book. One drunk night when they ...

This film is a bizarre collage of scenes put together to make a movie. I mean, the movie definitely has a story but there is so much extra noise that has been put in addition to the main plot that the film drags so much so many times that viewers can't help but say "Enough already!". I can see the director's intention but oh boy, did he miss the bus or what. The film is the story of an aging drag queen Tonia. Her love of life is Rosario, a drug addict half her age. For some reason she has fallen head over heels in love for him giving him lace to live, money, food etc knowing very well that he is not going to change his habits of drug and abuse. Tonia is getting old and has competition from an upcoming drag queen. At the same time, she is not too sure if she wants to undergo the sex change operation. The film randomly keeps following these characters and a host of other characters which have absolutely no bearing to the script or story of the film. FInally when Tonia g...

This is one of those films that start well but somewhere down the line gets a little confusing and by the end you really dunno what the director really wanted to say. It was a tiring silly film with overdose of overacting by the lead character. Pedro and Rui are deeply in love. On their anniversary, Pedro mets with an accident and dies. On the other hand Odete andher boyfriend break up because she desperately wants a child. She starts losing her mind soon after. She pretends that she knows Pedro and his mother (although she is just a neighbor). She sucks off the ring that Rui gifted him from the corpse's body and later hurls herself into his grave, screaming that she can't live without him. She then pretends to be carrying Pedro's baby and starts acting pregnant to everyone. Initially Pedro's mother doesn't believe her but ultimately takes her in when Odete starts spending day and night at Pedro's grave. Rui, meanwhile, struggles to come to terms with his very ...