Movie Reviews -
Gay Themed

Netherland-based queer drama Out is about two young boys in love and how their lives change when they move out of their conservative hometown to live the glitzy gay life in Amsterdam. I would say this film is extremely relatable. What does being in love for two men mean in the quiet rural life v/s city? What does liberation mean for them? Capturing the recklessness of youth and the excitement of newfound sexual liberties in sensuous black-and-white cinematography, Out offers up a vivid and tender tale of being young and gay. Tom ( a budding film maker) and Ajani (we are not surely told what is he studying) are closeted secondary school sweethearts who yearn for life outside of their small-minded, rural community in the Netherlands. While Ajani comes out to his family, Tom's family is different. Plus he is very sure that he is bisexual and keeps reminding himself and other. When They both get accepted in school in Amsterdam, their excitement knows no bound. Ajani is excited because ...

This nice little film is a subtle, but sharp dissection of family dynamics. The film feels like a carefully directed ping-pong match between family members, in which everyday life unexpectedly sets up as an obstacle which can threaten the happy existence of the family. The scenario, although seemingly simple, exposes layers that are about love, loyalty and the fragile balance within a family. I quite enjoyed this film. The film starts with Teen Tommy just having graduated, but sadly has also been dumped by his boyfriend and is struggling with the pain of heartbreak. His father, is well intentioned but unable to provide emotional support. His mother supports him unconditionally. When Tommy starts to work with his father Rin his workshop, he accidentally discovers email chain between his father and another man, clearly indicating a gay affair between the two. The young boy doesn't know what to do. Gathering courage, he asks his father about this, who tells him that this man was someo...

Why don't we make more such films? Sweet and earnest, this is the kind of film that’s easy to wrap your arms around because it understands that coming of age is inherently traumatic. Sometimes you don't need plot twists or bog dramatic reveals. This film about a 14-year-old kid who falls for the boy next door, causing him to question his sexuality and somewhat rebel against his parents treasures in fragile thoughts and feelings, mostly internalized, and also shows a sense of hope that you feel like a comfy blanket thanks to people around you and your family. We all could use some positive reinforcement about love in our lives and this film does exactly that. Elias, a young 14 year old lives in a small countryside village. His family is mostly a prototypical household: his older brother is dating, his caring mother supports her father's musical profession and a very empathetic grandfather who works in a farm and with whom Elias likes to spend time. Elias sorta has a girlfrie...

Wow! What a beautiful film and a subject that's probably tackled in most coming out films but hardly for 5 minutes. Making a full length feature film. A very impressive debut from the director, showing us the journey of tradition, culture family, roots, lifestyle and sexuality in a manner that, personally for me, resonated a lot. With an excellent cinematography and production design, it is not easy to hold on audience attention of a film l primarily happening in an apartment, but I absolutely loved it. Something about traditional and religious families and how they deal with their kids coming out is a topic that always fascinates me and this whole film is all about a man dealing with firestorm of his accidental coming out. Karim is a Moroccan descent Dutch successful businessman. The film starts with his father accidentally finding him and his boyfriend Kofi naked in Karim's apartment. Karim’s conservative, religious, family don’t know that he is gay and his father’s sight pro...

Club Church is a subculture within Amsterdam nightlife. This cruise club offering freedom, unprecedented sex and apparent absence of judgement has the film director constantly pushing his own personal boundaries, bringing out a side of him he didn't know existed. In this personal documentary the maker explores what Club Church means to him, while his late great-uncle, who was also gay, seems to watch over his every move. Robin Vogel bares all in a film about sexual identity, non-monogamy and bridging different worlds. The documentary starts with us meeting Robin's great granduncle, who also happened to be gay and together they shared a special bond and used to travel together for holidays. An elderly gay man who has never been able to live as freely as Robin himself. He is intrigued by the sense of freedom Robin gets from club chUrch. He then finds some candidates to interview and hear their perspective of the club and what it means for them which includes club regulars, his mo...

A psychological mystery thriller, this film was a weird watching experience for me. Using religion as the background, the film does feature a lot of dream-like/nightmarish sequences with the leading man, often to that extend that you don't always know for sure if he is awake or dreaming himself. This is also not a user film per say, but yeah the lead is bisexual man who is obsessing over another man. So even though the central theme of the film is not gay, the character trait is gay. Gerard is a bisexual writer. On his way to give. Lecture, he sees a hot man on the train station and completely obsesses over him, but the man soon leaves. During one of his lectures, he meets Christine who asks him to say the night at her place and they have a one night stand. She runs a beauty salon and apparently was married before thrice. Next day, Gerard sees a picture of Christine's boyfriend, a man named Herman, who is the same guy he saw at train station. He decides to stay longer hoping to...

This extremely slow film, for the most part, is a depressingly grim study of loneliness and sexual repression as well as of old age and family relations, in this case between a father and son. Not much happens and here is hardly any communication between characters (maybe spoken words are just about 15 minutes in the entire duration of the film). It is not an easy film to watch. I would also not classify this strictly as queer cinema and one of the chaplets is also about repressed sexuality here. Helmer is a single farmer in his fifties who lives with and cares for his aged, bedridden father in countryside. His working days are marked by the visits of milk collector, a man of his own age for whom Helmer holds a secret fascination – a mutual need is evident but unspoken. One day Helmer decides to renovate the house, buying himself a new double bed and moving his father upstairs. His life gains even more momentum when adolescent farmhand Henk is hired to assist. Surprisingly, the young l...

This has to be one of the weirdest 'film' I have seen. It neither falls into dramatic recreation and neither documentary, but he way it is presented is definitely documentary style with interviews and some other snippets which are so damn slow that it can put anyone to sleep. Based on the true story of the infamous Groningen HIV case, in which three men drugged other men and infected them with their own HIV-infected blood, Feast is a bold and provocative film that skillfully reflects the questions of life, death and morality that have emerged from one of the most disquieting stories in contemporary Dutch life. Sadly what the above statement is supposed to represent doesn't get translated on the screen at all. The film starts with a policewoman displaying all the objects that were at the sex party: from the wine glasses, CDs, to the sex toys. It was weird and long scene, but intriguing. Then we hear the conversation with Hans, one of the perpetrators, at whose house the orgi...

I was already sold on to the film because it was just under an hour long. i was really curious to see how film makers try to wrap up a story in such a short time, with hopefully, something meaningful to say. I have to admit that it did not disappoint at all. Primarily due to the fact that it felt very real and natural and something that can truly happen to someone in real life. Pepijn, is a freelance writer and Sjors works in a corporate company. They have been in a relationship for seven-years and have been exploring the idea of traveling the world. Their plans hit a roadblock when Sjors invites student Cas, new to town to sleep on their sofa without asking Pepijn for a few days till he gets settled. Quickly Pepijn begins to obsess over Sjors relationship with Cas and it brings out insecurities in their relationship. But soon enough, Pepjin himself begins to fall for Cas’ charms. In the meantime, clearly there are communication challenges between the couple. Pepjin wants to tra...

It would be understatement to say that the subject of this film is extremely risky. I am still very torn in my evaluation of this love story between an unlikely odd couple, especially when one of them is barely a teenager. Apparently this is autobiography, seen by some, as perverted, the film is nevertheless readily accepted by many others as a heartwarming and sympathetic view of youthful homosexuality. In the pre-liberation Amsterdam of 1944, parents are sending their children off to the country to live with relatives, hoping that the farms are safer. Young Jeroen is placed in the care of one such family, ably headed by God-fearing patriarch Hait. Before long, the area is liberated by a group of Canadian soldiers who then take up a brief residence in the local hotel before pulling out. One young soldier, the handsome, melancholy Walt, develops a close relationship with Jeroen, teaching him to dance and palling around with him at every opportunity. Sensing a kinship in the boy,...

This was a very interesting film. At 45 minute length, it's not short enough but neither a full length feature film. I guess it still deserves a quick short review, because this film focuses on the life of a gay Filipino houseboy in Holland. Something that I don't remember seeing before and the idea and concept felt very intriguing to me, and that made me pick this film to watch. The story is simple. We meet the "The Boy" whose name is never shared who works as a cleaning boy in the upscale and posh houses in Amsterdam. We watch him go house to house cleaning, and unknowingly also becoming a witness to their life. Andre, is the only house owner with whom he actually talks to while cleaning his home. Andre, being a writer, is always interested in knowing stories about the other houses. The Boy lives with his boyfriend who works as a dancer in a gay club and together they are looking to make ends meet. Clearly Boy cares about the boyfriend and his own family equall...

Gay cinema is becoming all too predictable and repetitive. I don’t mean to say that the films are not enjoyable, but I am craving for something new and different that I have not seen before. Till then, feel good gay-cinema is not going out of fashion and movie lovers like me are going to continue to enjoy movies like this. Luckily, we always have some good looking faces to admire and get some eye-candy. In case of this film, specifically, the print that I had was with the worst subtitles that I have ever seen. The translation was pretty bad and still it did give an idea on what the overall story was. Yad was a medical student in Amsterdam, but he was getting too tempted with the partying life, so he gets summoned back by his mother. Joris , on the other hand, is constantly at loggerheads with his mother, who has become very bitter ever since their father left them. He is now dead and all Joris has are his ashes in an urn. Joris is now supposed to find a job, and he starts as a cle...

Oh god! Another one of those wanna be pretentious movies, where probably the film maker thinks that its the best damn movie ever made. Only if the wishes could come true. European movies have sometime gotten away with what some people call as “weird” or “different” kind of cinema but this film has such a poor story and screenplay that it is unbelievable. I have never seen a film where no work has gone in any sort of character development. Eduard, possibly gay, leaves his good life in Berlin to move to Brussels to take up a big bureaucratic position in EU parliament. His sister and his friends can’t fathom why. Around same time, Edurne, leaves her over protective mother’s home in Sitges and takes up an intern job in the same building. They have a chance meeting and they start hanging out and pretty quick Eduard asks Edurne to move in. They have a strange connection, while Eduard is still struggling with his sexuality. We see he hooks up with a guy when she is not around. Edurne enj...

This was a sweet and short (50-min) made for TV film. I wouldn’t particularly classify this is a gay themed film but one of the two protagonists happens to be gay and hence it makes sense to review it here for my blog. Helen in her mid-late 40s has been leading a very affluent life. One day she comes home to find her dead husband and later realises that her husband had overdrawn his credit account and that suddenly Helen is now penniless compare to the rick upper class woman that she was so far. She moves in her daughter’s room (who is going for a long holiday), which is a in s shared space with common living room and everyone having a personal bedroom. She meets Joeri, a carefree good looking young man living a wild and i-don’t-give-a-damn attitude. He is not ashamed to admit that he works as an escort and his clientele is mostly gay men and married men and that he is open for any kind of fetishes as long as he can make money. Joeri and Helen form an interesting bond of friendshi...

I think this is the kind of film where it is important for the audience to know what they are actually getting into. And by that I mean, not just the storyline of the film but also a bit of history about the film and the subjects of the film. This film specifically relies too much on pieces of information about a then well-known Russian film-maker who was quite popular. And in this film, we get to see the unauthorised biography of what could have happened when he along with his crew visited Mexico to shoot for his next film. In 1931, Eisenstein, famous Russian director, drove from California to Guadajuato, after two years of unsuccessfully trying to get a production started in Hollywood. Eisenstein in a clownish and an eccentric  man who gets very fascinated by the country and finds too much similarities and differences between his motherland and Mexico. Canedo, is a handsome academician who has been assigned to the director to show him around and be his companion. The directo...

This was a very confusing film for me. I read this film has been featured in many comedy film festivals, which is weird because there is not a single comic scene in the film. I still am not very sure what was the point of the film and what was the exact message that the makers were trying to make in the film. Fred is a widower, devout and religiously conservative Dutch man. Being a good Christian, Fred decides to help reform a homeless man Theo and teach him a few things about responsibility and the importance of work. Theo seldom talks or initiates conversations and is more like a slow-witted robot—doing things Fred tells him but seeming to have little in the way of intellect. Sometimes he makes animal noises and is more interested in hanging out with farm animals than people. And, sometimes Theo puts on Fred's deceased wife's clothing. Despite this, both men come to care for each other over time. In fact, eventually Fred comes to love Theo and is convinced that God has a...

Gosh! Its been a while since I saw a really well made good gay film that so well balances the core theme (in this case sports) and the emotional ones. I wasn't sure what to really expect but am I glad or what to have seen this beautiful film. Specially worth mentioning is the fact that the director of the film is a female and making a film on a Dutch teenager who is trudging with his sexuality while balancing his dreams as an athlete and be there for his family. Teenage boy Sieger, a good athlete, is a caring boy who gets selected for a relay race. His brother Ed is a rebellious which is hard for their wider father who is trying to raise the boys as best as he can. Sieger seems to be compensating for his brother. Sieger and his best friend Stef get selected in the team with 2 other boys. One of them is Marc. The two boys keep stealing glances at one another and don't understand what is going on. His yearnings finally get into reality when the four boys go for swimming. When...

I still don't know why the film's title is so. I thought that they were probably the names of the characters but it wasn't it. Another interesting tidbit is that this film was actually nominated for oscars, which I was quite surprised when I found that out. This film is about feelings and true love. The film has a soap like story line but it is funny, loving and totally watchable. The film is about Nino and his 3 sisters. Nino is gay and the sisters are shocked when they find out suddenly that Nino is marrying a girl in 3 weeks. It turns out that as per his father's will, he can only inherit the property, a lavish hotel on a beach in POrtugal, only if he marries. He needs money and so he is marrying. The 3 sisters are mad because now this means they would not get the money. The three of them gang up together to figure out how to tell Nino's fiancé Bo all about this and get them to not marry. This is where the fun begins. All three sisters have their own issues...

First thing that comes to mind after the movie ends is how talented the entire cast was. Everyone in this film has done complete justice to their characters and somehow seem very fit to the role that they ere given. The movie starts slow but very quickly picks up pace and has various small subtle stories in between giving support to the main theme story of a brother and his sister.This is a story about families and how they come to grow, in all shapes and sizes, and what gives them their resilience and vitality, their importance in our lives. Marteen in an older gay man who lives with his sister Molly. Molly now wants to move in with her boyfriend. Marteen starts to realize the emptiness in his life with Molly gone. Over a period of time Molly's boyfriend starts acting weird and even cheat's on her. When she can't take it anymore she decides to come back to her brother. Marteen , in the meantime, meets a gorgeous man, who is straight but something about marten attracts him ...

This is a short 50 minute dutch film. The movie was weird and I cant decide how to rate it. I hope by the time I finish writing this review, I would have made up my mind. Kees is a bright, handsome kid, crippled by shyness, whose life is devastated by a group of school bullies. He lives in a huge mansion with his parents. Kees is attracted to the ringleader Charel, a beautiful athletic classmate who probably feels an undetermined interest but would never risk admitting (possibly not even to himself) having any gay or bi appreciation. Kees invites Charel back to his home when his parents are away, ostensibly to take revenge and seduce the older boy, but Charel's inability to drop the pretense and succumb to Kees' infatuation leads to a painful conclusion for them both. Kees goes completely berserk and self-destructs. I think that the reason for this is a combination of loneliness, self-hatred and frustration. Kees longs for, but cannot attain the object of his desire. Charel is ...