Movie Reviews -
Gay Themed

This film has got to be one of the earliest and most fascinating piece of cinematic history for its positive portrayal of a trans woman-of-color and her romance with her cis-gendered, white boyfriend. The fact that the film came out back in 1971 is just unbelievable. This film , in some ways, is still more progressive than a lot of current cinematic depictions of trans people. And to top that, the entire film is laced with some zany dialogues. I can't remember the last time I laughed at so many places because of some really smart dialogues and fights between the husband and wife. We meet George and Lettice: a school teacher and a celebrated author who are preparing for their son's visit who is bringing home his girlfriend. The father is pleasantly surprised because he didn't think his son ever had any interest in girls. And the mother, as much as she believe she is modern, she is only faking it. When their son Laurie arrives with Jo, it's a shock for everyone because Jo...

I am really not sure who was the target audience for this film when it came out. I can see that both gay community and biker gangs taking offense to the horrible stereotyping. Of course, because I am mad enough to put my head through some really bad queer films, I can never explain to myself why do I sit through the endless takes and torturous plot of ridiculous films like this one. A gang of bikers who call themselves Pink Angels riding their motorcycles from northern California to Los Angeles to participate in the Cotillion Ball, which we are told is a big drag event. Along the way we see multiple encounters of them with police hassling them, their fights at a diner, and some other gangs. They meet another bike gang and both of them want to use same picnic spot. I am not sure what really happens, but suddenly some women show up and then the other bike gang members are happy. Th pink Angels put makeup on the straight bikers while they are asleep after party. And in this all, we eep se...

This dramatic film from back in 1971 isa film about one night in a bar. Its Christmas Eve and in Manhattan's Greenwich Village, a group of gay men and lesbians meet at the mob-owned Blue Jay Bar to talk about their lives and relationships. While watching this film, I couldn't help but noticed myself thinking of the film 'The boys in the Band' a lot.  Trust me, the premise of the film, as I mentioned above, is just that. A group of friends talking about random things for a good 110 minutes, which are neither juicy, exciting or anything that I would care about. Every aspect of stereotypical gay literature is shown here. There is a confused married man, a new kid on the block from Nebraska, a self hating hustler, a mother drowning her son for being gay, a straight guy in a gay bar by mistake. Being shot in a real location, the production lacks fitness. The lighting is dark and shadowy and at certain points even out-of-focus making it all seem quite amateurish. But if you f...

This French movie came way back in early 70s when probably showing two men get romantically involved wasn't that easy. This film takes an interesting twist and adds the paradigm to what happens when a straight married man almost takes an obsession for a young hitchhiker and what happens thereafter. This is not really gay but more of a drama and that too with some psychological undertones. But having said that I can see why mostly only gay audience might appreciate the film, if at all. Driving one day, a much married man Etienne gives lift to a young hustler and hitchhiker Rudy, who is mixed up with a gang of thugs. Etienne takes instant liking towards the young boy and brings him home with him. Surprisingly his wife, Valentine also welcomes young Rudy in their home. They both seem to have some sort of open marriage and their luscious country home provides a very sensual environment. A weird and strange relationship develops between the trip. Etienne is clearly very obsessed with Ru...

Whether we admit it or not, most gays have thought of stories involving prison. Some find the thought exciting, while others scary and repulsive. In fact, a lot of film makers have explored this theme to variety of degrees and I feel that this is the third film in recent times that I am seeing that explores the basic theme of sexual slavery to survive in the prison system. Young Smitty has just come to prison. His cellmates are Rocky, a "dangerous and unpredictable" 19-year-old; Mona, an 18 year-old, who is regularly abused by prison mates and Queenie, a flamboyant gay man. Rocky explains the system: Unless the kid places himself under the protection of a regular old man, in this case Rocky himself, who has a place in the power structure, he'll be the victim of gang rape by everybody else in the cell block. Queenie encourages Smitty to beat up Rocky and spread the news so he can win a better protector from amongst the "politicians" for his own benefit rather tha...

Its hard to call this film as either a documentary or a proper feature film. And that has nothing to do with the longest title for a movie I have ever seen. The entire film is accompanied by voice-overs that are sometimes commentaries about the different gay life's styles and sometimes represent dialogue or narrations. There is no synch sound. The voice over and dialogue recorded do not match what is on the screen. It takes some time to get used to the format but then you find it ok. I think this is meant to be a perspective of and for a young gay man back in 1971. Daniel is a young, shy and innocent gay man who has just moved to Berlin. He meets Clemens and immediately both fall in love and get into the marriage kind of arrangement. But Daniel soon feels suffocated and leaves him. He find a rich older man who introduces him to art life style but once at a party the old man leaves Daniel for his other rich older friends. Daniel leaves him too, finds a place of his own and get ...