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

My Friend Dahmer (Cinema Review) – The infamous gay serial killer as a teen

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Often I like to watch films that I know nothing about besides the title so that it doesn’t taint my viewing experience, but having seen this movie I feel that having prior knowledge of the protagonist’s horrific crimes would have enabled me to have gotten more out of this film.

Having grown up in England and not having an interest in serial killers, I had never really heard of Jeffrey Dahmer and the 17 men and boys he murdered between 1978 and 1991. I read his Wikipedia page after seeing this movie and it shed a lot of light upon things that were hinted at, both subtly and explicitly, throughout the film. [Read more…]

The Florida Project (DVD Review) – A young girl lives a precarious existence next to the Magic Kingdom

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Director Sean Baker had a significant success with Tangerine, which followed two transgender sex workers as one of them looks for the man who broke her heart. With The Florida Project he stays with people living a precarious existence, this time in the shadow of Disney World in Orlando.

The movie is largely set at a budget hotel managed by Bobby (Willem Dafoe), where six-year-old Moonee (Brooklynn Prince) lives with her young mother Halley (Bria Vinaite). It’s an insecure, day-to-day existence where there’s no security and where they must move out for a while once a month, as they’re not permitted to officially become residents. [Read more…]

Ghost In The Shell (DVD/VoD Review) – Scarlett Johannson is just a robot with a human brain

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Despite being in development for years, the live-action Hollywood movie version of Ghost In The Shell seemed to have the cards stacked against it. Some questioned whether Snow White & The Huntsman’s Rupert Sanders was the right director for the job, and many more felt that casting a white actress in a traditionally Japanese role smacked of whitewashing. Sadly, when the movie arrived, it didn’t get the sort of critical and commercial reaction that might have been able to overturn the issues surrounding it.

The movie opens in the near future with the brain of a young woman being transferred into a robot body (Johannsson) – the first of her kind. The android is named Major, and with memories of being nearly drowned by terrorists, she becomes part of a special team tasked with particularly difficult, often technological crimes. [Read more…]

Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (Blu-ray Review) – The end of Milla Jovovich’s Alice?

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Resident Evil is the most successful videogame-to-film franchise ever, and the first to cross a billion dollars at the box office. To be honest though, that’s more because the competition has generally been so awful, rather than because Resident Evil is so good.

This was promised as the final part of the story of Alice (Milla Jovovich), although thanks to a $300 million gross (largely due to its popularity in China, as it bombed in the US) don’t be surprised if it returns to the big screen in some form. Set shortly after the last movie, Retribution, Alice is one of the few survivors of humanity, trapped between the undead on one side, and the evil Umbrella Corporation on the other. [Read more…]

Moana (Blu-ray Review) – Disney has a lot of fun in the Pacific

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A few years ago it seemed that Disney animation was slightly heading into the wilderness, but more recently they’ve come back with a vengeance, and a series of major hits including Wreck-It Ralph, Frozen and Zootropolis. That has continued with Moana, which brings us a new Polynesian Disney Princess.

Moana is the daughter of the chief of her island. While her grandmother talks of her people’s proud seafaring past, the Chief has banned people from going too far from the island, due to the dangers of the deep. However, the crops are failing and they can’t catch any fish. The reason for that is that years before, the demigod Maui caused the blight by stealing the heart of the goddess, Te Fiti. [Read more…]

Deepwater Horizon (Blu-ray Review) – Mark Wahlberg faces a real-life maritime disaster

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In 2010 the worst maritime oil spill ever took place in the Gulf Of Mexico, after an explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform. At the time, the media was so fixated on the oil that it was easy to overlook the fact that the initial disaster on Deepwater Horizon was truly cataclysmic and resulted in the deaths of 11 people.

Peter Berg’s movie sets out to redress the balance somewhat, depicting what happened on the platform and the horrific events the survivors endured. [Read more…]

Pride & Prejudice & Zombies (Blu-ray Review)

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Jane Austen gets an undead mash-up in the film version of Seth Grahame-Smith’s novel, which took the original text of Pride & Prejudice and added in a whole lot of zombies. The movie has had a somewhat troubled history, with various directors and actors coming and going, and with the whole thing looking like they’d given up on it several times. However, finally Lionsgate got it in the can with Burr Steers (Charlie St. Cloud) directing and Lily James and Sam Riley starring.

As you would expect, the Bennet sisters are living in Hertfordshire, with their mother keen to marry them off to eligible men. While Lydia, Mary and Kitty seem keen to take any suitable gent, Elizabeth (James) is more headstrong and independent. While fending off the advances of Parson Collins (Matt Smith), she meets the exceedingly rich Darcy (Riley), who she takes an immediate dislike to, seeing him as rude, judgemental and unpleasant. [Read more…]

Waiting In The Wings: The Musical (VoD/US DVD Review)

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I’m still surprised that there aren’t more gay-themed musicals, but it is a notoriously tricky and expensive genre, so generally the low-budget world of queer cinema hasn’t made as much use of it as you might expect. However, Waiting In The Wings takes on the singing and dancing with gusto, and backs it up with minor gay-icon cameos from the likes of Lee Meriwether, Sally Struthers, Shirley Jones and Christopher Atkins.

Anthony (Jeffrey A. Johns) is a small town guy with dreams of making it big in musicals. He thinks he’s got his chance when he scores a role in a new, off-Broadway production and so heads from Montana to New York. Tony (Adam Huss) meanwhile is a stripper who thinks he might be able to take it to the next level as part of a new all-male exotic dancer revue. There’s a bit of a problem though – the same man is producing both shows and has mixed up their similar names, so the small, shy Anthony ends up being asked to take his clothes off, while Tony, who’s never sung before in his life, is now in a musical. [Read more…]

Crocadyke Dundee/Wine, Women & Friends (DVD Review)

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It’s two for the price of one, as this release features a duo of documentaries from filmmaker Fiona Cunningham-Reid, which take a look into the lives of some very different lesbians.

First off there’s Crocadyke Dundee, which is a portrait of Dawn O’Donnell, who was a bit of a legend in the Sydney gay scene, opening numerous bars, clubs and other venues (including sex shops). The film also acts as a view into how gay life has changed in Australia’s most populous city, as Dawn’s involvement started back when being gay was illegal. At that point there were few gay venues and those that existed were at risk of being raided (indeed it’s suggested that having half their clientele occasionally locked up was built into the business plan of some of these bars).

Interestingly, despite the oppression and societal disdain, it’s suggested that those involved generally had a great time. [Read more…]

Mortdecai (Blu-ray Review)

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While some films get bad reviews, few movies with big name actors get excoriated like Mortdecai did on its cinema release. The film was greeted with some exceptionally scathing notices, but while you can understand some of the points those reviewers were making, the fact is it’s not half as bad as they made out.

Johnny Depp is Lord Charles Mortdecai, a British art dealer with an aristocratic background and penchant for shady shenanigans. He and his wife, Johanna (Gwyneth Paltrow), owe £8 million in back taxes and don’t have much time to raise it, although a possible lifeline arrives following the death of an art dealer and the discovery that a legendary painting by Goya may have been stolen from her. [Read more…]