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

Frankie Go Boom (DVD)

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Farce is a tough thing to get right even if you follow all the rules. Frankie Go Boom gets very close to being great – the actors are good (and appear to be having a lot of fun) and many of the scenes are very funny. However it ultimately falls foul of the problem that causes many farces to come a cropper – it’s actively nonsensical, which is rather frustrating.

Frankie (Charlie Hunnam) is used to being made a laughing stock by his older brother, Bruce (Chris O’Dowd). For example, Bruce put Frankie’s wedding video on the web, even though it featured Frankie discovering his wife-to-be was cheating on him, before he punches and then vomits on her. Unsurprisingly it was a viral sensation. [Read more…]

The Hunt (DVD)

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Winner of Best Actor and a couple of other prizes at Cannes, The Hunt comes to DVD with a great pedigree behind it. It would have probably got a Best Foreign Language Oscar nomination too, except that Denmark decided to submit A Royal Affair (also starring Mads Mikkelsen) instead, and each country is only allowed one film in the race.

Directed by Thomas Vinterberg (Festen), the film is about Lucas (Mikkelsen), who works at a local nursery school. He’s involved in a custody fight with his son, but things look up when it appears his kid will be coming to live with him. [Read more…]

Vito (DVD)

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I often turn into an old man when it comes to most people’s knowledge of gay history, or rather their lack thereof. For many people there was Oscar Wilde, Stonewall and then somebody decided equal marriage would be nice, and that’s about it. You can kind of understand the ignorance, as LGBT history is so resolutely ignored in schools that you’d be forgiven for thinking there isn’t one, so anything that comes along to remind us it was a long, complex path to get us where we are is very welcome. [Read more…]

Sagat (DVD)

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Ever wondered where the cut-off point between a short film and a feature-length one is? Well, it’s generally considered to be 40 minutes, which is, for example, the length the Oscars use. The documentary Sagat clocks in 41 minutes, so it just about fits into the feature-length category (it was originally made to fit in an hour long slot – including adverts – on French TV channel Canal+), although I’m sure you’ll be pleased to know there’s more than 70 of special features to bump up the amount you can get out of the disc. [Read more…]

Thale (DVD)

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After Troll Hunter comes Thale, another movie about Nordic mythology, although this one’s about something few people outside Scandinavia will have heard of, Huldra. These are female-like creatures, said to hum a tune that’s so irresistible that it can lure men from their villages, never to return.

Leo (Jon Sigve Skard) and Elvis (Erlend Nervold) head to an out of the way house for a crime scene clean up, after a very grisly dead body has been found. Newbie Elvis is having enough trouble dealing with the gore when he discovers a basement, full of strange bottles and tapes. While it appears empty, a woman then erupts out a milky bath. [Read more…]

Great Expectations (2012) (DVD)

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The BBC must like Great Expectations an awful lot, as within 12 months they produced a TV version starring Douglas Booth, Gillian Anderson and Ray Winstone, and backed this movie version from director Mike Newell (Prince Of Persia). They should probably have stuck with the very well received former, as while handsomely mounted and well-acted, Newell’s movie is a little flat. [Read more…]

Unfaithful (Infidèles) (DVD)

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And the award for French-est film of the year goes to…

With a decidedly arty attitude, nudity, real gay sex and people talking in the type of introspective philosophical way that only French people can master (I used to think this slightly existentialist way of speaking was a French film affectation that didn’t reflect how anybody actually spoke – but then I met some middle-class Parisians and realised it’s how many of them actually are). The only thing Unfaithful is lacking is croissant and berets to make it even French-er. I don’t mean this as a criticism, but the film is undoubtedly impressively French. [Read more…]

Baise-Moi – Uncut (DVD)

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Baise Moi (which has been variously translated as ‘Fuck Me’, ‘Shag Me’ and ‘Kiss Me’) is one of those films whose reputation rests largely on the controversy it generated. Banned in various countries – including its home nation of France, which isn’t a place normally associated with being squeamish about sex and violence – its mix of real sex and bloody violence set off a bit of a firestorm on its original release. In the UK it got off relatively lightly, although the BBFC did demand 12 seconds of cut. However, they’ve now relented and allowed the movie to be released uncut, and also unlike the previous UK DVD release, this time we get the widescreen version of the movie. [Read more…]

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