Queer as Film

My top 10 LGBTQ+ movies

I reckon I’ve seen enough gay cinema to be making this list and while it’s probably hard to narrow it down to just ten, here’s a run down of of my all time favourite LGBTQ+ films.

10) The Way He Looks

The Way He Looks is a Brazilian coming of age movie about blind teen Leonardo and Gabriel, the boy he falls in love with. The acting is phenomenal and the ending makes you feel warm and fuzzy.

9) The Miseducation of Cameron Post

Chloe Grace Mortez plays a young lesbian sent to a Christian conversion camp and plays it so well that the subject makes you feel sick at times. But the movie is brilliantly portrayed and shows just how hard it can be for the LGBTQ+ community.

8) Brokeback Mountain

It’s a classic, and it’s a classic for a reason. Brokeback Mountain was probably the first hugely popular movie centred on LGBT characters and I’ll forever be thankful for the work it did in Hollywood for future gays. Also, Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal are breathtakingly beautiful.

7) Blue is the Warmest Color

This was one of the first lesbian movies I watched, and whilst it is slightly controversial due to the movie having a lot of sex scenes that were clearly directed and created by straight men, it really is a beautiful movie which showed me that women can, and do, love other women.

6) Shelter

Gay surfer boys! That’s content I’m here for. Shelter is one of my favourite movies to watch whenever I need a pick me up and it never fails to make me smile.

5) Handsome Devil

Handsome Devil is another coming of age movie but this time it’s about two young Irish lads who both don’t quite fit into their boarding school and form an unlikely friendship. Andrew Scott also stars as their gay teacher/role model which we love to see.

4) Carol

Carol is a 1950s lesbian road trip movie with Christmas vibes that ends happy and I truly don’t know what anyone else could ask for in a movie. It’s beautifully shot and the acting is truly breathtaking.

3) Mario

Mario is the first of the movies previously written about on this blog to enter my top 10, so if you want a more in depth review than: gay footballers who just want to love each other, then check out my post here.

2) Gods Own Country

I really deliberated on whether to put this first or second but it’s ended up in 2nd place. Gods Own Country is the most beautiful film I’ve ever had the pleasure to watch, it focuses on Johnny who’s a young gay farmer struggling to enjoy life and Gheorghe, a Romanian farmer who just wants to love Johnny. It’s raw and stunning and made me cry both happy and sad tears, and there’s also a cute lamb.

Call Me By Your Name

Naturally, Call Me By Your Name (CMBYN) is my number one all time favourite movie, not just favourite LGBTQ+ movie. I’ve already made a separate post about this film too, which can be read here, but I’ve probably seen CMBYN almost fifteen times and it still makes me gasp and cry and want to run away to Italy for the summer. Truly, I don’t think I’ll ever not sob whilst listening to Mystery of Love by Sufjan Stevens.

Ideal Home or Ideal Movie?

This is a film that I hadn’t heard of before, but whilst browsing the Netflix ‘Gay Movies’ genre with my mum (the biggest LGBT+ ally I know) on a visit home we came across the 2018 film ‘Ideal Home’. We quickly decided to watch it because, well, it stars Paul Rudd as a cowboy hat wearing gay man and I don’t know what else you could ask for.

The movie centres on Erasmus (Steve Coogan) who is a celebrity chef living his best, rich life in a huge house with his boyfriend, Paul played by previously mentioned Paul Rudd. The two are at each others throats and don’t seem to have much common ground until Erasmus’ estranged grandson, Bill (Jack Gore), comes into his life.

The film is delightfully funny whilst still zeroing down on important issues such as Bill’s drug addicted father and the struggles of a 10 year long relationship between Erasmus and Paul. There’s also gorgeous cinematography and beautiful shots of sunny Santa Fe and some very obvious endorsement of Taco Bell that leaves you craving a ‘Crunchwrap Supreme’.

Steve Coogan plays bourgeois and flamboyant perfectly, whilst Paul Rudd has truly never looked better as a long suffering gay hipster with a beard and glasses to match. Throughout the movie you see the two navigate their relationship whilst adjusting to a trouble-making 10-year-old fitting into their lives, with a healthy portion of gay humour thrown in as well as a large side of Taco Bell nachos.

I recommend you go watch Ideal Home if you’re in the mood for a lighthearted, guaranteed to make you laugh out loud movie. Or if you just wanna see a cute child make a list of words not to call gay men.

It’s the gay SUBTEXT!

I’m possibly going against my own blog by making this post but some movies that have characters that claim to be straight just have too much homoerotic subtext for them to not be written about, but hopefully not to be confused with queerbaiting. So, in no particular order here’s some of my favourite gay ‘couples’ in film.

Charles Xavier & Erik Lensherr (X-Men Franchise)

These two really are the prime example of not gay but should be, specifically in X-Men: First Class. James McAvoy who plays Charles even said ‘It is a little bit of a mini-tragedy that [Xavier] and Magneto don’t, you know, have sex and become married and become best friends.’ I mean, come on, if McAvoy is saying it then you know it should have happened.

Arthur & Eames (Inception)

‘You mustn’t be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling.’ is what Eames says to Arthur before he blows up a telephone pole and it’s what I’d say to Inception director Christopher Nolan as to why he didn’t make them a couple. Their witty and flirty banter throughout the film shows more chemistry than most rom-coms nowadays.

Arthur actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt also agrees.
https://twitter.com/hitrecordjoe/status/905431681053614084?lang=en

Geralt & Jaskier (The Witcher)

Okay, technically not a film but DigitalSpy posted an article entitled ‘Is The Witcher gay, or very gay?’ and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since. To me, and pretty much every other LGBT+ fan of the show I’ve spoken to, it’s pretty obvious that Jaskier is queer. However, this is probably more of a case of unrequited love than the other two friendships I’ve mentioned. Jaskier follows Geralt about like its nobodies business and the poor bard even writes a olden days version of ‘Jolene’ by Dolly Parton, whilst Geralt defiantly seems more interested in Yennefer. Still, there’s an obvious hint of homoeroticism and I’m here for it.

‘I’m weak, my love, and I am wanting’ Okay Jaskier, we get it, you love him.

Pride, but it’s a movie.

Matthew Warchus’s 2014 film Pride is one of the best all round LGBTQ+ movies I’ve ever seen. The film centres around the true story of a group of young lesbian and gay activists who raise money for Welsh miners during the miners strikes in 1984-85. It’s heartwarming and uplifting and extremely well acted to round it into a triple threat.

The movie, set in Britain’s 80’s world of Thatcher, touches on so many issues of the time. Mark Ashton (Ben Schnetzer) is a young gay man unapologetically living his life when he realises that the cops are bothering the gays less and the miners more. In response, he sets up the LGSM (Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners) and begins work recruiting fellow gays to help his cause.

This movie made me cry and laugh probably more than any movie I’d seen in a while. The reluctant acceptance of support from a bunch of London gays from the Welsh miners is portrayed so beautifully, being shown perfectly when Jonathan (Dominic West) shows the Welsh lads how to dance.

The film also touches on the issues surrounding the AIDS crisis, police brutality and the conservative government in the 80s whilst still managing to stay magically funny and wholesome.

All round, Pride is an amazing film that never fails to make my day better whenever I decide to re-watch it for the 70th time, the characters are as true to the real story as I’ve seen in any good ‘based on a true story’ movie and there’s even a heartwarming end screen showing what they’re all up to now.

Please go check it out if you’re in the mood to swoon over Andrew Scott’s smile or learn a little more about how the LGBT and mining communities faced and continue to face austerity.

San Junipero, the Black Mirror episode we deserve.

Black Mirror’s San Junipero isn’t technically a movie, but I think it’s Emmy more than qualifies itself for it’s own dedicated blog post.

If you’re not familiar with Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror then the simplest way to explain the complex series that it is, is to say that each episode is full of twists and turns and is pilled to the top with futuristic and technological aspects. There will be spoilers in this post, because its hard to describe the magic of the episode without explaining the twist, so read ahead with caution.

Black Mirror S3 trailer, in which this episode is featured.

San Junipero is primarily set in the beautiful beach town that shares the same name as the episode. Yorkie, played by Mackenzie Davis, meets Kelly (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) in a typical 80s nightclub, 80s tunes blaring to immerse you even more, and the two flirt and then have sex in Kelly’s beach house, despite Yorkie being engaged to a man.

Over the next 20 years Yorkie visits the nightclub each week looking for Kelly but never finds her until 2002, and this is where the classic Black Mirror twist happens. Kelly rejects Yorkie’s advances and all of a sudden you’re left staring at the screen, mouth agape, as you learn that San Junipero is a simulated town that the elderly and dying go to to live out the remaining life and death as their younger selves.

But the shock of the twist isn’t why I love this episode so much, it’s the tenderness, the yearning and the representation of soft lesbians that gets me. And, to make it even better, it ends happy, with Yorkie following Kelly into San Junipero after she dies. There’s dancing on the beach and kisses under the moonlight and cinematography that would make anyone sigh at the beauty.

If you haven’t yet seen the episode, then I’m sorry for spoiling it for you, but please go watch it nonetheless and enjoy.

The Miseducation of Gays in Hollywood

The first time I remember knowing an actor was gay was Neil Patrick Harris. My family would sit and watch How I Met Your Mother together, when I was certainly too young to be watching it. One night my older brother announces to me that the guy who plays Barney is gay. ‘That’s cool’, I had told my brother, I also watched Torchwood with my family and due to Jack Harkness and Ianto, I proudly knew what being gay meant.

However, it wasn’t until I was a lot older that I understood how important it is for LGBTQ people to have representation on the big screen. I was fourteen and struggling to come with terms with my own bisexuality when Ellen Page came out, I was also fourteen and obsessed with Inception. It’s really empowering to see people like you in the media, to see that no matter anyone’s sexuality they can do what they dream of.

Ellen Page comes out during her HRCF speech

Ian Mckellen has been publicly out since 1988 and has been doing activism work ever since, Kristin Stewart talks about being gay more than her appearance in the Twilight franchise and Neil Patrick Harris does yearly support videos for national coming out day.

As someone who likes Broadway I can tell you that there’s no shortage of gay actors there. In fact, current Broadway musical The in the Band stars Jim Parsons, Andrew Rannells, Zachary Quinto and Matt Boomer who are all publicly out. However, LGBTQ+ actors may still struggle to find work – in 28 states in America it’s still legal for workers to be fired due to their sexual orientation- and this shouldn’t be the case in 2020.

The issue of lack of representation for gay actors really comes into light when you look at the Oscars, as of 2019 a grand total of 25 actors had been nominated for playing an LGBTQ+ role (Timothee Chalamet in Call Me By Your Name, Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger for Brokeback Mountain to name a few) and out of those 25 nominees not a single one of them was openly LGBT.

Personally, I’m beyond thankful for the LGBTQ+ representation that we do have in actors across the world and I only hope it grows in the future.

Mario: teammates to lovers

Marcel Gisler’s 2018 Swiss film Mario probably changed my life. I’m aware that seems dramatic but after watching it I spent weeks telling everybody I spoke to about how amazing it was, despite the headache I had from crying over it.

The movie centres on two young, up and coming footballers falling in love and dealing with the very real homophobia in professional sports. I don’t want to add any spoilers in because if you haven’t yet seen Mario you absolutely need to.

Mario (Max Hubacher) plays for BSC Young Boys – who actually let the film be filmed in their training ground – and ends up slowly falling for fellow teammate Leon (Aaron Altaras) as they navigate a relationship playing together and as lovers. The acting is breathtaking and the realism from the on-set locations make you feel as if you’re actually watching them fall in love.

I think the reason this movie resonates with me so much is because as a queer football fan it’s so important to see that LGBTQ footballers do exist and witness the struggles and cover ups that they must have to go through. As a woman, I see plenty of female footballers in loving gay relationships but there’s currently no out male footballers in the top five European leagues.

Mario perfectly touches on why male footballers may still face snide homophobic comments from teammates and the fear of losing sponsorship and fans from club owners past their prime, whilst still showing the pure and wholesome love between the two young men.

Stonewall currently have an amazing campaign called Rainbow Laces which focuses on the inclusion of LGBTQ fans and players in sports. The Premier League support the campaign by wearing pride coloured laces and captain armbands for a week in December and sure, it’s not going to fix all the problems queer people face in sport but it’s a damn good start.

Liverpool FC captain Jordan Henderson on his support of the Rainbow Laces campaign
(James Pearce’s Twitter – https://twitter.com/JamesPearceLFC/status/1199599083616374787)

Call Me By Your Favourite Film

Okay so, Call Me by Your Name being the first film to feature on this blog is probably a cliche. The peach film; the one with Timothee Chalamet; the one with the twins from the Social Network; whatever you call it, there’s no doubting that it’s one of the best pieces of LGBTQ+ cinema to grace this planet (with an Oscar to prove it).

If you haven’t already seen it and need a brief synopsis, Timothee Chalamet plays Elio who is a teenager wasting away his summers until Oliver (Armie Hammer) shows up to work on his post-grad dissertation with Elio’s father, and oh dear, he’s hot. Insert gay panic, falling in love and then some Kleenex and Twitter rant worthy end scenes.

SPOILERS AHEAD

The film on a whole is beautiful, from the moment Elio first dares to kiss Oliver to the moment he’s sat crying with the fire illuminating his face as Oliver marries a woman.

There’s so much in between those two moments though, shy glances, soft touches, nose bleeds and so, so much love. Luca Guadagnino broke my heart and then pieced it back together about ten times in 132 minutes of run time, and I can’t praise his directing and Timothee and Armie’s acting enough.

Sure, it doesn’t end happy (though there is still hope for the upcoming sequel) but that’s something you have to get used to when watching heart wrenching, angsty gay movies. What it does end is leaving you thinking about warm Italian summer nights, bicycle rides spent laughing with your boyfriend as you wind through cobbled streets and stolen kisses that remind you that there’s nothing more butterfly in stomach worthy than two people finding the person they love most in the world.