Big Gay Picture Show

Taking a look at the world of film through gay eyes - news, reviews, trailers, gay film, queer cinema and more

Taking a look at the world of film through gay eyes - news, reviews, trailers, gay film, queer cinema & more

Boys On Film 18: Heroes Trailer – The gay short film collection comes of age

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Boys On Film has reached legal age with is latest instalment! The award-winning gay short film compilation reaches its coming-of-age with Boys On Film 18: Heroes. The release features ten uplifting and powerful tales recounting the lives of everyday gay, bi or transgender heroes, fighting for the right to be be themselves. The shorts include the docudrama The Colour Of His Hair starring God’s Own Country’s Josh O’Connor (God’s Own Country), the Egyptian animation Half A Life, and Iris Prize 2017 winner, Mother Knows Best.

The trailer for Boys On Film 18 has been released. Take a look at it below, along with more info about the short films included in the release. It’ll be released on DVD & VoD on April 23rd.

DANIEL (UK, 2015, 14 mins)
Director: Dean Loxton
Starring Henry Garrett (Poldark) and Éva Magyar (X-Men: First Class)
Dániel is studying in London while working part-time as an escort. He is invited to a lunch by his best friend Nori. She surprises everyone by introducing her new lover Tom, with unforeseen consequences.

BUDDY (The Netherlands, 2015, 12 mins)
Director: Niels Bourgonje
When a young man is asked by his ex lover to support him during an HIV test, he sees an opportunity to find out if there is still a chance for reconciliation.

HALF A LIFE (Egypt, Indonesia, USA, Netherlands, 2017, 12mins)
Director: Tamara Shogaolu
Pairing the intimate narration of a young, Egyptian gay activist with a highly stylized animation, Half A Life brings the streets of Cairo to life through this firsthand account of the increasingly oppresive social climate of Egypt.

UNDRESS ME (Sweden, 2013, 15 mins)
Directed by Victor Lindgren.
When Micke meets Mikaela on a night out, he is immediately attracted to her, as he can sense that there’s something different about her. When Mikaela explains that she is trans he gets confused, aggressive and also curious. Undress Me examines and challenges our perceptions of gender.

THE COLOUR OF HIS HAIR (UK, 2017, 23 mins)
Director: Sam Ashby
Starring: BAFTA-nominated Josh O’Connor (God’s Own Country.
Based on an unrealised film script written in 1964, when homosexuality is still illegal, The Colour of His Hair merges drama and documentary into an impressionistic meditation on queer life before and after the partial legalisation of homosexuality in 1967.

SILLY GIRL (UK, 2016, 5 mins)
Director: Hope Dickson Leach
Starring: Clara Baxendale (My Mad Fat Diary) and Jason Barker (A Deal with the Universe).
Silly Girl is all about the first time you are noticed, that first time someone sees you for who you are and the transformative nature of that moment. From the Director of The Levelling and co-written by Game of Thrones’ Ellie Kendrick.

AN EVENING (Denmark, 2016, 10 mins)
Director: Søren Green
Frederik has had sex for the first time with Mathias, his friend from school. Whilst Mathias embraces what they have done and is keen to move forward, Frederik struggles to understand his own feelings and his newfound desire for Mathias.

AIDS: DOCTORS AND NURSES TELL THEIR STORIES (UK, 2017, 26 mins)
Director: Alejandro Medina
For the first time, doctors and nurses who cared for Britain’s first AIDS patients in the 1980s tell of the extraordinary situation they found themselves in and the rules they had to break to help patients forgotten by the state.

IT’S CONSUMING ME (Germany, 2012, 3 mins)
Director: Kai Staenicke
From the director of B. A young man obsesses over his ex-lover as he takes us through a collage of memories, the highs and lows of their relationship and images of his ex-boyfriend’s new life with his new lover.

MOTHER KNOWS BEST (Sweden, 2016, 13 mins)
Director: Mikael Bundsen
Starring Alexander Gustavsson from Girls Lost. A mother gives her teenage son some friendly advice on their way home from having met his boyfriend for the first time, but this innocent conversation leads to revelations that threaten to completely change their relationship. Winner of Iris Prize 2017. [Read more…]

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God’s Own Country (Blu-ray Review) – Does the BAFTA-nominated gay-themed movie deserve its acclaim?

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In most years we’re lucky if one gay-themed movie could be classed as a crossover success, but in the UK we had two released at cinemas within weeks of one another last autumn – Call Me By Your Name and the homegrown God’s Own Country. Although the former is now a quadruple Oscar nominee and the latter isn’t (although it did score a BAFTA nomination), as God’s Own Country star Josh O’Connor has said, that’s more to do with the lack of resources for a major Oscar push than because the movie isn’t good.

God’s Own Country follows young farmer Johnny Saxby (Josh O’Connor), who lives on a remote smallholding in Yorkshire with his recently disabled father (Ian Hart) and his taciturn grandmother (Gemma Jones). With most of his schoolfriends having gone to university or moved somewhere bigger, Johnny is leading a lonely existence. He has started drinking heavily and having occasional, casual sex with guys – although with no conception that it could be more than just one-off sex. With the lambing season on its way, they decide to hire someone to help, which brings Romanian immigrant Gheorghe (Alec Secareanu) to the farm. [Read more…]

The Shape Of Water Tops BAFTA Nominations, While Call Me By Your Name Leads LGBT Nominees

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Today the nominations for the BAFTA Film Awards were announced, with Guillermo Del Toro’s grown-up fantasy The Shape Of Water leading the pack with 12 nods. It scored nominations for Best Film, Original Music, Cinematography, Production Design, Costume Design, Sound, Editing and Special Visual Effects. Guillermo del Toro is nominated for both Director and Original Screenplay, Sally Hawkins for Leading Actress and Octavia Spencer for Supporting Actress.

Next up were Darkest Hour and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, which both receives nine nominations; Blade Runner 2049 and Dunkirk with eight, and I, Tonya with five. Many were surprised that Blade Runner 2049 did so well, especially as it scored a coveted Best Director nomination, alongside nods in numerous technical category.

The gay-themed Call Me By Your Name picked up four nominations, including Best Film and Adapted Screenplay for gay writer James Ivory. Luca Guadagnino is nominated for Director, while Timothée Chalamet is nominated for Leading Actor. There was no nomination though in the Supporting Actor category for Armie Hammer, despite him going into awards season as one of the frontrunners for the equivalent Oscar.

Chalamet was also nominated in the previously announced EE Rising Star category, which is voted for by the public and goes to an up and coming actor. Also nominated in that category is Josh O’Connor, who starred in the gay Brit hit God’s Own Country. That movie was also nominated for Outstanding British Film, but unfortunately it wasn’t seen included in any other categories, despite being one of the most praised British movies of the past year.

Other LGBT nominations include I Am Not Your Negro in Best Documntary, which is about gay activist and writer, James Baldwin. Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool scored three nominations including Leading Actress for Annette Bening and Jamie Bell for Leading Actor. The characters they play are bisexual, although it’s treated a very minor point in the movie.

Take a look at the full list of nominees below? [Read more…]

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Gay-Themed God’s Own Country Wins Big At The British Independent Film Awards

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It may not have won the most awards, but the gay-themed Brit flick God’s Own Country picked up the big gong at the British Independent Film Awards. It picked up four awards, including the top prize, Best British Independent Film, along with Best Actor for Josh O’Connor, Best Debut Screenwriter for Francis Lee, and Best Sound.

The movie tells the story of the growing relationship between in isolated, young Yorkshire farmer, and the Romanian worker brought in to help him during the lambing season.

Lady MacBeth picked up the most awards overall though, with five, including Best Screenplay for Alice Birch, Best Actress for Florence Pugh and Most Promising Newcomer for Naomie Ackie. Armando Iannucci’s The Death of Stalin meanwhile picked up four awards. The only category of the night open to non-UK films, Best International Independent Film, was won by Get Out.

Although God’s Own Country is seen as an outsider for nominations in the major international film awards, it’s got a brace of gongs on the film festival circuit, including at Sundance and Berlin. It will also hopefully get some love at the BAFTA FIlm Awards.

For a full list of winners head to bifa.film/awards/winners

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Hide & Seek (DVD Review)

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Four 20-somethings – two men and two women – arrive at a house in the country with a plan to create a new community, where they will shut themselves off from the outside world. There are a few rules, such as that a couple – a different combination each time – will be locked into the master bedroom every night and not allowed out until the morning. They all also gather each evening to play games, talk and watch performances. They have no external contact, don’t pay attention to the news and try to create something carefree and almost childlike.

The bonds between the quartet start to deepen as they share each other’s lives, which includes various combinations of sexual sharing, initially between boy-girl couplings before becoming more bisexual and polyamorous. However, when someone from one of their pasts comes to visit, it threatens to disrupt their carefully created world. [Read more…]