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

Coffee House Chronicles: The Movie (DVD Review) – Gay gays meeting & hooking up gets the anthology treatment

By Leave a Comment

Starring: , , ,
Director:
Running Time:
Certificate:
Release Date:

Coffee House Chronicles was originally an anthology Youtube web series, but here the episodes get pulled together and slightly recut to turn them into a movie. While that may sound like a slightly cheating way to monetise the show, it actually works surprisingly well. As individual episodes they were quite fun, but pulled together thye add up to more than the sum of their parts, allowing it to layer together a light look at the way modern gay men relate to one another.

The film consists of a series of first encounters (mostly) between gay men, most of which – as the title suggests – take place in coffee houses. These meetings range from a man realising his ‘date’ is much younger than he’s said he was, to someone in a long-term relationship trying to organise sex with a porn star for his boyfriend. There’s also a trans man on his first date with a woman after transitioning, and two zombie extras in a movie figuring out if they want to go on a date even though they don’t know what they really look like under the makeup. [Read more…]

Such Good People (US DVD Review)

By Leave a Comment

Starring: , , , ,
Director:
Running Time:
Certificate:
Release Date:

One of the ‘barriers’ to having gay people in films is that a lot of the time filmmakers and producers feel there has to be a reason for a character to be gay (and to be honest, a lot of audience members aren’t much better). Unless they’re a very minor character or we’re supposed to be laughing at their campery, an LGBT character’s sexuality has to be intrinsic to the plot or they don’t exist – something that’s not demanded of straight characters.

It’s always good then when a film comes along where with a few nips and tucks the two main characters could have been straight, but they’re not, and the movie doesn’t try to de-gay them by essentially treating them as friends who say they’re in a relationship but show no signs of it. [Read more…]

Help Screwball Gay Comedy Such Good People, Starring Michael Urie & Randy Harrison, Get Made

By 1 Comment

Whether crowd-funding movies will work in the long run still isn’t clear, but at the moment it’s a great way for films that would find difficulty getting cash through traditional sources to get made. One such film currently looking for backers is the gay-themed Such Good People, and unlike many others, it already has a cast attached of fairly well-known names attached, representing the good and the gay of US entertainment.

Michael Urie (Ugly Betty, Partners), Randy Harrison (Queer As Folk USA), Lance Bass (N*Sync), Bree Turner (Grimm, The Ugly Truth), Jon Polito (American Gangster, Gangster Squad), Alec Mapa (Marley & Me), Drew Droege (Eating Out: Drama Camp), Mitch Silpa (Bridesmaids, Along Came Polly) and Broadway legend Sandra Bernhard are all set to star. The film is about ‘A young, gay couple discover a secret room filled with cash while house-sitting for wealthy friends… who die while out of the country.’

The makers are looking for $50,000, which is the bare bones of what’s needed to cover production costs, although the more cash they get, the more they’ll have to spend on locations and more time to shoot the film. Stewart Wade (Tru Loved, Coffee Date) is set to direct from a script by David Michael Barrett.

The makers says, ‘Our risks and challenges will be enormous. Even though that is true of every film production, at every budget, the smaller the budget the greater the challenges… We have something else, too: We have passion! And we believe that passion plus experience will equal a great little movie that will, with your help, come together to truly be something special.’

If you’d like to know more or give some cash, head over to Kickstarter.

CHECK OUT THESE RELATED ARCHIVES:
ACTORS: , , , , , , , ,   DIRECTORS:   

Tru Loved (DVD)

By Leave a Comment

Starring: , , , ,
Director:
Running Time:
Certificate:

While a lot of the time in the world of no-budget gay movies it wouldn’t make much difference if there’d been more cash to give a film a bit more polish, with Tru Loved it’s a real shame as its lack of panache (particularly it’s audio problems) is likely to limit its audience more than it should.

Tru (Townsend) has just moved from San Francisco with her two moms to a much smaller community. There she meet Lodell (Thompson), the high school quarterback. [Read more…]