Movie Reviews -
Gay Themed

I try to at least skim reviews before diving into these BL shows so I don't waste my time on a dud. Should've listened to myself this time, because this series ended up being a complete waste of hours I'm not getting back. There was real potential buried in this premise, but neither the acting nor the direction brought any life to it at all. Getting through all eight episodes, each around forty five minutes, felt like a genuine chore. A young guy named Kim relocates to an island city to move in with his uncle. There's apparently some backstory behind why, but honestly it barely matters. Once there, he meets a chef named Tao Sor. The next day when he runs into him again, something feels different, and Tao Sor doesn't even recognize him. It turns out this mysterious chef is dealing with some condition that wipes his memory clean every single morning, meaning someone has to constantly remind him who he is. Kim starts developing feelings for him and pitches an idea to t...

It's been a minute since Russell T Davies put out a new show, so Tip Toe was obviously near the top of my watch list. This one feels really tied to the current moment, specifically the fear, anger, and hopelessness that come with being queer in the UK right now. There's this line one character says, something like he used to walk into a room and go ta da, and now he tip toes just in case, and that pretty much sums up the whole show. It runs five episodes, roughly fifty minutes each, blending thriller elements with social drama to capture where things stand with rising homophobia today. Set in present day Manchester, the show puts two neighbors with completely clashing worldviews next to each other and builds its whole story around that friction, working as both a suspenseful watch and a genuinely unsettling mirror of real life. Leo's almost sixty, runs a local queer bar, and has just split from his longtime partner, now getting used to being single again. Right next door is...

This documentary pulls together oral history to trace a very specific New York chapter of gay life in America. Back in 2014, someone found a box stuffed with hundreds of letters sitting in a storage unit in LA. These letters went all the way back to the 1950s and were written to a young guy named Reno Martin, who'd later become known in Hollywood as agent Ed Limato. When Martin left home to chase a radio career, his closest gay and queer friends kept writing to him just to stay in touch. Every letter's signed with a fake name and ends with a warning to burn it after reading, which tells you everything about an era when just being gay, or dressing in drag, could get you thrown in jail. The filmmakers actually tracked down the surviving writers, now in their eighties and nineties, and turned what could've been dry historical digging into something genuinely personal and intimate. The people behind this doc found the original letter writers themselves, several of whom are stil...

How can there be such a dirth of stories that these vertical filmmakers keep rehashing t he same 5-6 permutations and combinations of story and do some sort of mix and match. It's almost like some old fantasies being brought to life in these formats. I am really starting to completely lose it. And then you read all these random glowing made up reviews online and you wonder if people are watching the same thing that I am. Liam and Noah are stop brothers but not many people know it. Noah's girlfriend actually likes Liam and tris to seduce him. Meanwhile Liam secretly crushes on his stepbrother Noah. Since Liam cant have Noah, he suggests the girl that maybe she should ask Noah for threesome. This is where a drunk Noah shows up against his better judgment and the two finally kiss. Now Noah is also confused as to is he gay and ho can he be attracted to his step brother. The story slowly moves with the two men slowly starting to realize the good points of each other and fall in love...

This coming of age movie is about two teenage guys who are total opposites on paper, but both carrying stuff from their past, and we watch them work through it and fall for each other along the way. It plays like a teen rom com at first, but it turns into something way more personal by the end. Not gonna lie, I don't get why they picked the English title they went with, because the original translates to Fifteen Days, and that just fits so much better. It's based on a book apparently, and honestly what makes it work is how uncomplicated it stays the whole time. It's got this bright, warm feel to it, and it's not just about two boys falling for each other, it's really about learning to stop hiding after years of trying to be invisible. Felipe's sixteen and has always been insecure about his weight because kids gave him hell for it growing up. He's out as gay and lives with his mom, who's a big presence in his life. Summer rolls around and he'd honestl...

Sadly this series ends up falling into the same trap most GMM shows do. I really wanted this one to be good, the setup genuinely had potential. And honestly it does start off strong, playful, funny, with this fun little love scam angle running through it. But once you hit around episode four or five, it slides right back into the same tired formula every other show like this follows, leaving barely anything memorable behind. Twelve episodes, each around fifty five to sixty minutes, so it's asking for a real time commitment, but it doesn't really deliver enough charm to justify all that. The story revolves around cousins Pai and North, both heirs to a wealthy, influential family. Pai's thriving in business, while North keeps burning through family money on failed ventures. First we meet Tim, whose chance encounter with Pai slowly develops into a slow burn romance. Except pretty quickly it's revealed Tim's been targeting Pai from the start, hoping to make him fall in ...

This movie was just plain weird. I really went in wanting to like it, but the whole pretentious, overly poetic vibe, combined with this choppy editing that keeps hopping back and forth in these tiny five to ten second bursts, just made it feel dragged out for no real reason, way too self indulgent if you ask me. Honestly this could've been trimmed down to a fifteen minute short and lost nothing. And I still don't get what the deal was with women dancing along the beach while some overwrought, flowery narration plays over the top. The plot creeps along at a snail's pace, slowly building toward some confrontation that you can see coming from a mile away and that just gets duller the closer it gets. By the time it actually happened I'd totally checked out as a viewer, even with two genuinely good looking guys leading the film. The setup itself is pretty basic. Lorena and Diego are trying to settle into a new life in a small town by the coast, both nervously starting fresh ...

This premiered on HBO Max, and it's honestly one of the more unique queer stories out there, built around those specific moments in life where you're forced to grow up fast, where discipline, softness, and real sacrifice suddenly become non negotiable. It's a genuinely moving look at gay parenthood that happens completely by accident, following a hard partying twenty something gay model who suddenly has a baby become the center of his entire world after he's forced to raise his niece. There are eight episodes total, and I'd really tell you to slow down with this one and actually sit with it instead of rushing through. The show kicks off with a gay orgy, introducing us to Filip, a model who's deep into drugs, partying, sex, and basically refuses to take anything in life seriously, work included. With his good looks and sharp jawline, he figures he can get away with anything, until his sister lays down an ultimatum that he needs to move out, since he's basical...

Watching this 1995 film feels like stepping into a whole different era. Back then, testing positive for HIV wasn't an automatic death sentence anymore, though people were still dying from AIDS related complications regularly. So building a romantic comedy around AIDS as the backdrop was a genuinely bold move for its time, and for me it mostly works, though I'll admit if I'd caught this closer to its original release, I probably would've been more receptive to how it handles the subject. Either way, the film puts the conversation out in the open and does its part to chip away at the stigma and mystery surrounding it. The movie centers on Jeffrey, who's grown completely disillusioned with finding a decent partner in early nineties New York City, a place still holding onto its reputation as a gay mecca from decades past but badly bruised by the AIDS crisis of the previous ten years. He decides to swear off sex entirely once the fear of AIDS sucks all the enjoyment out ...

Like the recycled tropes across pretty much every vertical BL show weren't already enough, now the writers aren't even bothering to try anything new. The second I started this, it felt weirdly familiar, so I actually went back through my old reviews to check, and sure enough, this is basically a carbon copy of Hard Shift, just with the jobs swapped around and a bit more thirst trap content sprinkled in. Seriously, put in a little effort here. Set in a Christian university, Brady is the campus heartthrob, a well known playboy and captain of the hockey team, who takes a hit to the crotch during a game and gets injured. Medical intern Marven rushes over to help, and right away Brady feels this weird pull toward him. During the exam, which actually makes Brady finish, Marven tells him he might have erectile dysfunction and needs to spend a few days under Marven's care to sort it out. Brady's always considered himself straight, but Marven's upfront about being gay, and B...

You could basically sum this one up as a queer neo-noir erotic thriller centered on a closeted cop who openly admits he's a sex addict and slowly spirals out of control over the course of the story. There was a whole era where these sleazy, sweaty, unapologetically trashy films thrived on dangerous attraction, moral gray areas, and characters just making awful choices under a haze of neon lighting. Not this one though, at least not for me. This film misses the mark on a lot of fronts and honestly never grabbed my interest. The biggest reason is that the plot gets so tangled up and confusing that huge chunks of it just don't add up. Aiden's a cop in Sydney fighting hard not to masturbate, since he's dealing with some form of sex addiction and has convinced himself that abstaining makes him both physically stronger and a sharper cop. He takes this so far that at one point in the middle of the film he actually buys himself a chastity cage. He's part of a unit working t...

This series follows university students dealing with ambition, desire, jealousy, and messy relationships inside a performing arts program. It's made by GMMTV, and watching it felt like they pulled together every lead actor they've ever worked with, big roles and small. So many familiar faces pop up. There are three main couples plus a bunch of side characters who matter a lot to the story. It runs 12 episodes, each about 55-60 minutes. The story starts with students prepping for a stage version of Romeo and Romeo. Jack is directing and holds open auditions for the roles. His ex Dean used to get the lead automatically in Jack's shows, but this time Jack says roles go only to whoever auditions best. Dean still wants Jack back and tries to seduce him, but Jack turns him down. Another student, Raffy, likes Jack and figures getting cast will help him get close to him, but Jack has no interest in Raffy at all. Jack's stepbrother Rome likes Raffy, but Raffy keeps brushing him ...

When I read the summary about anonymous figures wandering the streets looking for hookups until one of them slips past the locked gate of a city park to wander its trails, I got curious and figured this might turn into some kind of erotic mystery. Turns out that one line basically sums up the entire runtime. This whole movie is just one single night of gay cruising inside an amusement park, broken up entirely by glances exchanged and bodies coming together. One guy locks eyes with another somewhere on a path, and pretty soon they're tangled up together among the trees and fences. The film bounces between something like fifteen or twenty different men, almost nobody speaks a word, and basically the entire runtime is just these guys cruising and hooking up around the park. Given the subject matter, yeah, this gets explicit, exactly what you'd expect. I kept asking myself, and honestly I'm still asking, whether this is meant to be actual porn or some kind of legitimate art fil...

Watching this movie honestly felt like sitting through a Spanish soap opera, the way it's shot, directed, acted, and presented, all of it had that vibe. The pacing feels really off throughout. Just like a typical soap, it drags out the buildup way longer than it needs to before rushing through the payoff. And then the final act just speeds through everything with a few half baked speeches and a bunch of smiling faces, landing on a really underwhelming ending. To be fair, the film does dig into some genuinely important themes worth talking about. It's a decent reminder of how damaging prejudice can be and how much family really matters. David and Bruno are a gay couple who've been together four years and are trying to have a baby. David's twin sister Virginia offers up her egg so they can use a surrogate along with Bruno's sperm. Her husband Miguel is furious about the whole decision, and it creates real tension within the family. A month goes by with no pregnancy an...

Season 2 of Mujhe Rang De picks the story right back up between Shikhar and Agastya after season one ended with the two of them finally admitting they love each other. Having gotten through all 7 episodes, each running around 30-35 minutes, I really appreciate that this genuinely feels like a real continuation of what came before, not just a cash grab sequel. We actually get real insight into why Shikhar's so cold and closed off, learning about his past and watching how the two of them grow together as a couple. Every character from season one is back too, best friend Meera, both their mothers, plus a major new addition in Tarun, who takes the whole story somewhere new. Shikhar and Agastya have been living together a full year at this point, and life's settled into a pretty steady routine. Meera's even got a new boyfriend now. Shikhar seems content in the relationship, but Agastya's constant insecurity starts getting under his skin, and he can't figure out how to re...

Gotta admit, the whole premise of this show is so out there that I'd bet you've never come across anything quite like it before. Taking on a concept like this is a massive gamble for any writer's room. Thankfully the people behind it chose to keep the tone light, which means as an audience you can just let go of how ridiculous the setup is and lean into the humor and cheerful chaos that follows instead. The whole thing radiates warmth, positivity, and a ton of heart. Sure, there are plenty of things you could pick apart, but they're easy enough to overlook. It runs 10 episodes, each landing 40-45 minutes. Pobmek and Solar are a gay couple, and both of them work as elementary school teachers. Through a bunch of flashbacks we learn that Solar always dreamed of teaching, while Pommel was originally headed toward accounting, but he loved Solar so much he switched paths just to become a teacher too. Pommel can't get his classroom under control at all, meanwhile Solar...

I've got a whole new respect for actual vertical series after sitting through a couple of AI generated ones lately. This one especially caught me off guard, no underworld or gang subplot in sight, the girlfriend isn't some evil scheming villain out for revenge, love actually gets prioritized, and there's not that constant cycle of dumb misunderstandings either. On top of all that, we get two new lead actors, and one of them's rocking a pretty hot beard. Story wise though, it's clear at this point everyone's pulling inspiration from the Heated Rivalry formula and putting their own twist on it, and here that twist lands in the world of rugby. Colby Stryker is the golden boy captain of the Los Angeles Stallions, heading into the season determined to hold onto his title, his reputation, and the picture perfect life he's built for himself. His biggest problem shows up in the form of Ridge Maddox, an intense player out of Kansas whose sheer talent and fearless ene...

Honestly I couldn't quite decide if this counts as a film or a documentary. Since it's shown up at a few doc festivals, I'm just going with documentary for now. The setup is that after his older boyfriend loses interest in him, a filmmaker packs up and moves to Chicago, then starts using dating apps to recruit new guys into this loose, undefined project exploring attraction, compatibility, and attachment, something his own mother apparently can't stand. Sitting through all seventy something minutes of it, my honest take is this thing feels completely aimless, and even the people who made it seem to admit that themselves. It does raise some genuinely hard questions, but they come across more like natural byproducts of trying to figure out intimacy in a situation where nobody ever sets clear boundaries. Bethel splits from his older boyfriend and settles into life in Chicago. He knows he wants to start some kind of film project but has zero clue what it's actually abou...

I've got pretty conflicted feelings on this one. It kicks off strong with all the mind games and manipulation, but somewhere along the way it turns into such a confusing, repetitive slog that I started checking out mentally. On top of that, the whole BL angle ends up feeling like an afterthought compared to the bigger story the show's actually chasing. Instead of playing out as a standard romance, it goes for something much darker, building relationships around trauma, power dynamics, and serious emotional imbalance. I can see this concept working if someone really committed to making it a proper drama, but for me personally, my patience ran out. Each episode also clocks in around seventy minutes, which is a lot to ask of anyone, and the whole series runs ten episodes total. Our two main guys are Vier and Kelvin. Vier's the confident heir to the VPG group, polished, calculating, and used to coming out on top. Kelvin's on the flip side, the ignored son from a rival famil...

It's always nice when Asian production companies swing for something different and actually pull off a story that feels new. The opening episodes of this fantasy romance are genuinely delightful, with a concept that feels fresh and catches you off guard in a good way. But the deeper you get into it, the more the storytelling starts falling apart into confusion and misunderstanding piled on misunderstanding. And personally, the ending was a total letdown for me. The cinematography out on the island is gorgeous, and both couples give you that heart fluttering feeling, but it really needed more care put into how it all wrapped up, especially given how tangled the plot got by that point. The show runs 12 episodes, each around 35-40 minutes. He Xiang Yong ends up back on a small island near Taipei after losing his job. Things with his father are already tense, and he can't shake the feeling that everyone on the island is silently judging him. Together with his best friend Li Wan Zhe...

Season 4 just dropped for Single Out, and it's the last one, 8 episodes running about 20 minutes a pop, closing out the story for Adam and everyone around him. I'll admit I was pretty much ready to walk away after season three, but it seems like the people behind this wanted one more round to tie everything off properly. This time around the whole thing centers on Adam trying to figure out his next move after Single Out magazine shuts down, and how that ripple effect plays out for him and the people in his orbit becomes the season's real throughline. Every familiar face from the first three seasons shows back up, and honestly it's still a little disorienting because so many of these guys blend together visually. Adam and Gabe are engaged now, but between their job situations and money being tight, an actual wedding plus finding a place to live both feel out of reach. That's where their friends and family step in. Gabe pulls off a surprise wedding, small and intimate...

Muxes are recognized as a third gender among the Zapotec people down in Oaxaca, southern Mexico, and they're non-binary in how they live their identity. Mexican culture leans pretty machista overall, so muxes end up filling caregiver roles a lot, and they earn real respect both for that work and for who they are. This film feels less like a movie and more like a piece of visual art that pulls you straight into what it actually feels like to live as a muxe. I honestly can't think of another film that functions this much like a painting come to life. It's packed with life, with love, with real heartbreak too, and the whole thing comes across as this incredible burst of culture and creativity. You might not walk away loving it purely as a story, but there's no arguing with how gorgeous and vivid it looks. The film follows a community of muxes pushing back against the idea that gender only exists in two boxes, and we spend time with three of them, Delirio, Amaranta, and Mar...