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

Forever Marilyn Box Set (Blu-ray)

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Was Marilyn Monroe a good actress? In my opinion no (although she desperately wanted to be), as her range was extremely limited. But what she had in spades was star charisma; an inexplicable power to make you watch and empathise with her on screen. It’s this, as well as her iconic look, tragic story and untimely death that has ensured she has become a legend, with many believing she’s more famous now, 50 years after her death, than she was when she was alive. With that sad anniversary arriving on August 5th, Fox has released the Forever Marilyn Blu-ray box set, which includes four of her most famous films – Some Like It Hot, The Seven Year Itch, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and How To Marry A Millionaire.

To be honest, it’s only Some Like It Hot that can be considered a true classic, as it’s likely the other three would be largely forgotten if it weren’t for the presence of Marilyn. Gentlemen and Millionaire in particular are the lightest of light comedies. Indeed it’s an odd fact that like many actresses of her era, she’s more famous than the films she starred in – after all, everyone knows Monroe’s face, but most have seen few, if any, of her films. [Read more…]

The Mission (DVD)

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Set in the Mission District of San Francisco, Che (Benjamin Bratt) is the hard-assed, ex-con father of Jessie (Jeremy Ray Valdez). The teen hasn’t had the easiest of lives, but has found some measure of happiness with his boyfriend, Jordan (Max Rosenak). Jessie keeps the relationship a secret, but when Che finds some Polaroids snapped at a gay bar, the truth is out. Che is less than happy having a ‘faggot’ for a son, and is utterly unwilling to try and understand it. The best they can do is come to an uneasy silence over the subject.

As Jessie nears graduation and the Mission’s homophobia builds to potentially lethal levels, Che remains unable to accept his son. Although it seems the wedge between them is immovable, can father and son ever come back together? And can Che fins his own redemption in a relationship with Smoke, who almost acts as his conscience? [Read more…]

Bel Ami (Blu-ray)

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Robert Pattinson in a drama that’s all about sex and power should be enough to have teenage girls  (and many a gay man) wetting their knickers, although this certainly isn’t a film for twi-hards. Pattinson plays George Duroy, who in 19th Century France leaves the army and heads to Paris to make his fortune. He soon realises that he needs contacts, and that even if he can get one or two of those, no one is simply going to hand him the treasures he wants.

The fact he has few skills would seem an impediment, but what he’s well aware of that he has one thing in his favour, he’s irresistible to women. This starts to become his way into Parisian high society, picking the ladies who can offer him his next step up the ladder. His conquests include the forthright and astute Clothilde (Christina Ricci), the devoted and normally faithful Virginie (Kristin Scott Thomas), and Madeleine (Uma Thurman), a woman who in the modern day would be smashing through the glass ceiling, but in 19th Century France has to settle with being a professional wife whose light must shine through the men she’s with. [Read more…]

Wild Bill (Blu-ray)

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The word on upon its cinema release Wild Bill was very positive, and reviews were certainly of fairly enthusiastic nature. So Dexter Fletcher’s directorial debut is a welcome release on DVD and Blu Ray.

Fletcher has had a very long career in both film and TV, starting off in Bugsy Malone in 1978, and so he’s brought this wealth of experience to his first feature, both as writer and director. The movie is set in the London Borough of Newham, against the backdrop of the Olympic site. Whilst magnificent structures loom in the background, we concentrate on the characters involved in the shady goings on on an estate. [Read more…]

I Am Bruce Lee (Blu-ray)

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As the title suggests, I Am Bruce Lee is all about the martial arts action superstar, taking in his entire life and featuring rare footage of Lee, along with plenty of interviews with his friends and family. There’s no doubt the documentary will be of most interest to fans of Lee, but there’s also plenty to appeal to those whose interest in the actor is more tangential.

The film covers everything from his birth in San Francisco and early life in Hong Kong, through his rise as both an actor and martial arts instructor in the US, before he headed back to Asia to make the likes of The Big Boss, which led to the classic Enter The Dragon. Of course, he tragically died shortly before that film was released. There’s plenty of interesting info, from the fact he returned to the US at the age of 18 partly because he’d gotten into so much trouble fighting, to the battle he had to conduct with old school martial artists who said he shouldn’t be teaching non-Chinese people Eastern styles. [Read more…]

Children’s Film Foundation: London Tales (DVD)

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If you’re of a certain age, you’ll remember the Children’s Film Foundation. Starting in the 1950s, the British Film Industry came together under the direction of J. Arthur Rank, to produce wholesome kid’s entertainment under the CFF banner, which would provide more innocent fun than what was being imported from Hollywood. They were largely shown at Saturday Morning Pictures and matinees through the 50s, 60s and 70s, but as TV started to take hold and children had other things to do on a Saturday morning, CFF films got ever more marginalised until they eventually stopped producing short movies. [Read more…]

The Lacey Rituals (DVD)

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The Lacey Rituals is the sort of release that shows why we’re very lucky to have the British Film Institute. It’s a collection that will never appeal beyond a niche audience, but is something it’s more than worth collecting together and digitising for posterity. And without the BFI it’s unlikely it would ever have happened.

Bruce Lacey is seen by many as a seminal figure in the emergence of performance art in the 1950s and 1960s, with his influence perhaps best felt in those around him, such as The Goons, Ken Russell, Richard Lester, Peter Cook, The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and Monty Python. Things such as his work with the Albert Brothers (a small bit of which is included here, but which largely went undocumented) pointed the way towards a new form of anarchic, slightly homemade comedy, with a surreal bent but genuine thought and ‘meaning’ behind it. Lacey describes this is ‘the triumph of the amateur’, something that’s true of much of his career. [Read more…]

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