Movie Reviews -
Gay Themed

Taps (India) As they embark on a year of long-distance, a misunderstanding threatens to derail the domestic idyll Akshay and Rohan have built over the last four years​. It puts a microscope on a couple who navigate the journey to finding their way back to one another after unraveling. How are they gonna spend their last evening together? Fighting, loving or being naughty with one another? Decent attempt but not great! Read Aloud (USA) Justin is a film editor surrounded by performances. Sick of sitting in a dark room watching others, he starts to envision ‘70s cabaret style performances of his own. When a new relationship starts to develop, Justin has to decide how badly he wants to come out from behind the camera. This short film is about performance on and off stage - how Justin performs his roles as a gay man, as an editor, and as a twenty-something sexual being when he meets different guys for hookups. The Surf Report (USA) A ghostly love story unfolds as two men look for answers wh...

Oscar Wilde has had quite a few films made on him covering various chapters of his life. I was looking forward to this film hoping to learn something new again, but this film really could've done with a round of storyboarding and editing and maybe a script or even a premise. This pseudo documentary style film reimagines the famous novelist’s 1882 tour of America as taking place at a present-day coast-to-coast road trip. According to the makers, the film is an optimistic reflection of contemporary life in the U.S., where the flamboyant Wilde can find the self-liberation and acceptance that eluded him in his own era. In 1882, the 27-year-old Wilde embarked on a 150-city tour of the United States, which set records for ticket sales at many of the venues he appeared and made nationwide headlines. Despite never having been to America before, Wilde was hailed and welcomed as a literary genius with an unflagging spirit and a unique wit — both of which are conveyed in the film. This romp r...

This is BL show from Myanmar, clearly inspired heavily from the Thai BL shows that are based in university and schools. The ending felt a bit open ended and something that I was not expecting and also I am not sure what the makers were trying to say, but at least the world of BL is expanding. With 9 episodes each of about 10 minutes, the show moves slow even though there is a proper story, I feel like the screenplay and direction lacks finesse, but good for the attempt I would say. Also what's up with the name? Should it be 'My Heart' looking at the heart on posters? The show starts with a girl being killed in a bar and fast forward one year later. Thu Kha is a young boy studying in school. He has some heart condition but is overall ok. A new student Nay Thit joins the same school after getting expelled from previous school. He becomes friends with Thu Kha and his friends and soon enough the two have some spark going between them, despite rumors around Nay Thit having anger...

Internalized homophobia can be a powerful force. We tend to think of it simply as lingering shame, or even as something that goes away upon coming out, but in fact its can take many different forms and is often culturally specific. We have seen many films about homosexuality and religion.  Add to that superstition and witchcraft and you get a nice little new genre that we probably have not seen before in gay films in recent times. With Egypt as the background and it looks visually stunning, this film is a taut, suspenseful thriller about gay men trying to reconcile their homosexuality against their family’s religious beliefs. It gets intense with several jump scares, but it is artfully made. Mo and Hisham are a couple who are visiting Egypt to meet Mo's mother after his father's death month ago. They need to pretend to be just friends in order to stay safe in Egypt’s very homophobic environment. Coming back to Egypt, however, leaves Mo especially anxious and uneasy, because he ...

Firstly this is not really a movie. It is more like 6 episodes stitched together for a total of about 50 minutes. Now I dont know if the came this way or the version I saw was more like 6 episodes stitched together, whatever be the case, it was just a bit silly and something that I did not enjoy much. The story was basic, acting slightly over the top, and really not much memorable to take back home. Troy recently moved to Brooklyn with his friend Pat and his then-boyfriend Chance, but Troy and Chance broke up, and haven’t yet post-processed the breakup to see if they might reconcile. Troy works as a busboy and just generally walks around grumpy and bitter, still having feelings for his ex. When a new neighbor moves in, the sweet looking 29 year old middle school teacher Abel, Troy's hope for a rekindled romance with his ex-boyfriend gets officially placed on the back burner. Troy and Abel begin getting to know one another, complicating the “will they or won’t they” reunion with Cha...

Layla is a beautifully observed narrative of love, sex, gender and friendship. The summary of the film doesnt even encapsulate everything that the film is trying to show. It says "When Layla, a struggling Arab drag queen, falls in love for the first time, they lose and find themself in a transformative relationship that tests who they really are." It is a pleasure to have a film that revolves around drag performers; not having them at the periphery of the narrative as dressing, but centering their stories and granting visibility to their interiority. The love journey will be full of ups and downs, sometimes you may or may not agree to what you see, but rest assured that everything is handled with a gentle touch that a subject of this nature deserves. Layla is introduced living in London with their community of queer friends, performing drag and attending parties together. They have amazing rapport with each other. In one such parties, Layla meets Max, A conventional very stra...

I saw the first two of the show a few years back, and had no idea on when did the third season come out. It's really hard to keep up these days. I actually had to go back to my review to read and refresh my memory on what the series was about so I could appreciate this season. Consisting of 8 episodes of 10-12 minutes each, the story carries forward from where we left off in season 2. A quick recap: Jason and Brian were together for many years before Jason got cancer and he passed. Brain has a very close circle of friends and support system and he tried to move on with a new guy David and since Brian could never let go off Jason, it didn't really work out with David. The season continues with the story where we see that Brian has immersed himself in work and despite the fact that he wants to move on from Jason, his friends and support system around him don't let that happen. In fact, the ghost of Jason still continues to talk to Brian. At a friend's recommendation, Bria...

Another queer film with religion as the backdrop. But here the conflict is different and relatively new. The gay couple here needs to confront themselves and each other on their beliefs on what they want before they start to deal with problems that the society throws their way. During an era where legislators and religious organizations are weighing in on queer rights all around the globe, this film provides a considered perspective on the juxtaposing relationship one can have with organized religion, God, and queerness as a whole.  Peter is an English Vicar now serving in New Zealand. He was happily married, and he currently has an adult-aged daughter as well. After his wife died, in his moments of grief, he met Jason, who happened to be in prison at the time. Before this occurred, his queerness wasn’t something Peter ever really thought about. But then Jason fell into his life and the two fell in love an make for a beautiful couple and everyone knows about them. Jason runs a yout...

Ganymede is something of a hybrid, mainly functioning as a coming of age queer drama commingled with the horror. With its religious homophobia at its core, this feature is semi-horror, not in a scary way but more in subtextual nuances. It confronts us with the horrific bigotry and abuse that is heaped upon LGBTQ existence from right-wing religious hate. The film tries to show an important lesson that will speak to many young people struggling with their sexual preferences, especially amongst problematic family members. Set in a small town in the modern-day Bible Belt, it centers on high school wrestling star Lee , the only son of a deeply religious local politician who runs his household with an iron fist. Kyle , a gay student who is out to his classmates, has a crush on Lee. He finds out that Lee volunteers to clean up trash on the school grounds, so he signs up to join him. They start hanging out together, which makes Lee’s parents nervous, as well Lee also unsure about his feelings....