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Showing posts from October, 2016

Being at Home with Claude (Canadian French)

This one falls into that darker corner of gay cinema. There was real potential buried in here, but the execution feels so flat that at points it plays out more like a filmed stage play than an actual movie. It's a dark psychological drama built around a street hustler confessing to a brutal, confusing murder of his own lover. Black and white flashback sequences do a solid job laying out the details of what happened, but the real focus stays on the dialogue and the writing itself. Right at the start, a young hustler has already killed his male lover Claude. Three days go by before he calls the police to turn himself in for the murder. But instead of just reporting it somewhere ordinary, he actually summons the police and the local press directly into a judge's private chambers. Yves has keys to the place, which tracks given what he does for a living, but having the press waiting right outside makes the whole scene look like some elaborate blackmail scheme against the judge. The ...

Gay Short Films : 50

Birdbath (Australia) A young Oz-Malaysian couple struggling with their relationship. The asian guy is not sure if his family will accept their son’s sexuality and relationship. A Brief History of Princess X (France) A history of sculptor Constantin Brancusi’s ‘Princess X’, a futuristic bronze phallus that is actually a bust portrait of Napoleon’s equally infamous great grand niece, Marie Bonaparte. Curmudgeons (USA) A pair of senior citizens in 80s have a relationship that shocks both their families. When the grand-daughter comes to visit, Ralph couldn’t possible imagine the surprise she has in store for him from his lover Jacky and his grand-son. A potty-mouthed, but endearing, comedy. Realness With A Twist (Paris) A young man searching for identity and acceptance as he splits time between the normal everyday life (pretending to be playing football) and the thump and excitement of the Parisian voguing scene. Una pared (Cuba) [A Wall] Tommy, a young construction w...

La fête des pères (French) [Father's Day]

Yeah, it's pretty clear this kind of gay comedy could only have come out of the 90s, back when creators had way more freedom to just do whatever they wanted on screen. Thomas and Stéphane are a wealthy, happy gay couple living in France. All they really want at this point is to raise a kid together. Through this whole comedic chain of events, they head to Martinique to buy a black baby, and end up getting scammed out of five thousand francs in the process. Eventually they manage to track the guy down and get their money back. Along the way they run into Carole, a friendly and attractive woman who actually helps them recover the cash. They talk her into becoming their surrogate, but she insists it has to happen through natural conception only. The rest of the movie basically follows them trying to make that work, and eventually they go along with it, sleeping with her, and end up becoming dads to twins. The copy I watched had some genuinely terrible subtitles, sometimes they weren...

Esteros (Spanish / Portuguese)

What a beautiful film!! I did not have much expectations from the film and did not have any idea what the film is all about but I was pleasantly surprised. Agreed that the pace of this film could be found a bit too slow for a lot of viewers but in my opinion that just made this film even more beautiful and an experience to watch the relationship between the two friends. The film is told in two simultaneous generations. Childhood friends Matias and Jero spend many summers together in the Argentinean wetlands of Esteros. They both are really close to each other, just like their families. The boys spend all the time together and one such summer night, they get much closer and intimate. Unfortunately, their mutual attraction never finds a conclusion because Matias’ father agrees to a job in Brazil. Present day, Matias now has a girlfriend and the two are visiting his hometown for her cousin’s graduation celebration. Matias and Jero reconnect and you see the initial awkwardness soon tu...

Romeo & Julian: A Love Story

It's gonna be really hard to really explain the genre of this film, but in short this isa feature length full on musical gay porn. Honestly I have never seen one before and have no desire to ever watch one again. How I wish I knew this was porn. But even if you remove the lengthy 3-4 full on sex scenes, the story itself is so ridiculous. Julian is a single gay man who is lonely since most have his friends now have boyfriends. He meets Romeo at a bar and they connect  leading to first full on sex scene. They become boyfriends but Romeo likes to go out t o bars and have fun including hookups but he doesn't tell Julian anything and makes excuses that he is working late. When Julian finds out truth, he is mad but Romeo convinces that they should together go to a birthday party. But that ends up being a full on orgy (another full on orgy scene) and Julian angrily leaves while Romeo stays. Romeo later feels bad, takes a flower and goes to apologize to Julian promising full faith lead...

Departure (UK)

I love fucked up family dramas. They give an insight into human emotions and what they are capable of. Its also goos to see that not all families are happy-go-lucky. They all have some real issues that they have to deal with. Beatrice and her son Elliot arrive somewhere in France to pack their bags and empty their summer house, because it is sold now. A decision that was taken by Elliot’s father, Philip (who doesn’t show up until later). We also have Clement, a young boy form Paris, visiting his aunt in the same town because of a family turmoil. Elliot falls for Clement in their first meeting, which he knows but Clement is very indifferent to it. He agrees to their invitation to help them pack giving Elliot an opportunity for them to hang out. Clement is friendly and proves to be a sympathetic ear to Beatrice, which makes Elliot jealous. He thinks she is now his rival and wants Clement. Elliot knows what he wants and he is vocal about his feeling to Clement who just ignores it. Cl...