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

GAY INTEREST MOVIE REVIEWS

The latest gay interest film reviews from BGPS

Handsome Devil (DVD Review) – Being young & gay at boarding school can be tough in the charming Irish film

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Handsome Devil became a bit of a fave at film festivals, winning multiple awards at the likes of FilmOut San Diego and the Jameson Dublin International Film Festival. You can see why, as it’s a sweet film, which does a good job of capturing the confusion, anger, cruelty and contradictions that are so often part of teenage life. Some of it will also be worryingly familiar to those who went to a rugby-mad boarding school.

Ned (Fionn O’Shea) feels like a total misfit. He’s constantly bullied at his Irish boarding school and called all manner of homophobic slurs. At first, he’s pleased that this year he’ll be getting a room to himself, but that’s disrupted when new boy Conor (Nicholas Galitzine) is assigned to share with him. Neither boy seems happy with the arrangement, with Ned certain that sharing a room with the boy who’s being held up as the school’s new rugby star will just mean he’ll get picked on even more. [Read more…]

Women Who Kill (US Cinema Review) – A lesbian wonders if her new girlfriend is a killer

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Morgan (Ingrid Jungermann) and Jean (Ann Carr) host a radio show/podcast all about exalting female serial killers. They also used to be girlfriends, but split up and now have a close but dysfunctional relationship. Indeed, they’re pretty much co-dependent, despite not being lovers any longer.

Then Morgan starts dating a new woman, the mysterious Simone (Sheila Vand). While she’s smitten with her new love, others aren’t quite sure about her, including Jean. Initially Morgan thinks her ex just doesn’t want her to be happy, but then she starts noticing that there are definitely some strange things about her girlfriend. As there’s a serial killer lurking somewhere out there, could Simone somehow be connected? [Read more…]

American Gods – Season 1 (DVD Review) – Strange, surreal & TV’s most explicit gay sex ever?

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Quite a lot of people have tried to get Neil Gaiman’s 2001 novel to the screen, but it’s never happened until now. Despite being beloved by a lot of people, you can see why the money men were nervous about ponying up the cash for a film or TV version, as the book is often strange, surreal and quite graphic, with various tangents and peculiar moments that could be unintentionally funny in the wrong hands.

However, executive producer Bryan Fuller was the right man to hire, as with the likes of Hannibal and Pushing Daisies he’s shown an affinity with unusual, multi-layered tale that often verge towards the surreal. He certainly brings that to American Gods, which is often perplexing and weird, and will annoy some due to the fact it obstinately refuses to fully explain what going on. [Read more…]

Girls On Film 2: Before Dawn (DVD Review) – The lesbian short film collection is back

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The gay-male focussed Boys On Film series is the most successful short film collection in the world, and recently celebrated its 16th instalment. A couple of years ago, it was joined by a sister release, Girls On Film, which presented a selection of lesbian-themed shorts.

Although there’s been a bit of a delay between releases, Girls On Film is back with Before Dawn, which features 11 short films from around the world. It’s an eclectic and interesting selection, so take a look at what we thought below. [Read more…]

Something Like Summer (Outfest Review) – Lovers become frenemies in the gay-themed, coming-of-age musical

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I’m still surprised there aren’t more gay-themed musicals, but we’ve got a new one with Something Like Summer. It’s not a typical musical, as rather than taking place in a hyper-real world, it tells a story of love and loss that occasionally jumps from the real world to a stage, where the main character breaks into song. It’s an unusual way of doing it, and the first couple of times it’s a little jarring, both because its slightly unexpected and because the musical sequences are quite spaced apart.

However, they’re catchy songs, sung well and after you get used to it, they add real charm to the movie.

Something Like Summer, based on Jay Bell’s popular novel, follows Ben (Grant Davis) over the course of 12 years. It starts when he’s an out gay high school student with a crush on popular jock Tim (Davi Santos). After they literally bump into one another, they start a fledgling relationship. However, Tim is still unsure of his sexuality and wants to stay in the closet, as he’s afraid of what will happen if anyone finds out. [Read more…]

Boys For Sale (Outfest Review) – Life as a male prostitute servicing gay men in Tokyo

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If there’s a stereotype about being gay in Japan, it’s that the subject is taboo and hidden. However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t a large, vibrant LGBT community in the country. Boys For Sale looks at one aspect of that – the ‘Urizens’ – the equivalent of rent boys, who work in Tokyo’s main gay district, Shinjuku 2-chome.

The documentary mixes interviews with a variety of urizen with anime style representations of what they’re talking about. It’s a very effective way of presenting their words, as it helps bring it to life in ways just listening to their voices probably couldn’t. [Read more…]

A Quiet Passion (Blu-ray Review) – Terence Davies & Cynthia Nixon explore the life of Emily Dickinson

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Filmmaker Terence Davies early work was intentionally autobiographical. The likes of The Terence Davies Trilogy, Distant Voices Still Lives and The Long Day Closes looked at growing up working class in Britain in the 1940s and 1950s, touching on the overwhelming effects of Catholicism on him, as well as his own difficult relationship to being gay. Although his work then hasn’t been so explicitly based on himself, there have always remained very distinct echoes of the director in the subjects he’s chosen and the way he’s approached them.

That continues with A Quiet Passion, his biopic of 19th Century American poet, Emily Dickinson. Davies personal connection to the material is apparent from the first scene, where a young Emily is being asked to pick between two strict ideas of where she and a group of other young women stand in relationship to Christianity. However, she stands alone, unable to say where she should be. Once again Davies is fascinated by the push and pull of religion, of someone who wants the world while simultaneously limiting themselves to a small part of it, as well as the strictures of society for those who both desire to fit in and reject it. [Read more…]

All Male, All Nude (VoD Review) – Gerald McCullouch takes a documentary look at a naked gay strip club

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Magic Mike has certainly made people a lot more interested in male strippers. Well, people were already interested in male strippers, but now it’s more socially acceptable to acknowledge that interest. Gerald McCullouch, who’s best known as an actor in the likes of CSI and the BearCity movies, follows up his feature directorial debut, Daddy, with the documentary All Male, All Nude.

The film goes inside Swinging Richards, the US’s only all nude, all male, gay strip club. While you might expect such a venue to be in New York, Los Angeles or perhaps even New Orleans, it’s actually just up the road from an Ikea in Atlanta, Georgia. About half the footage in the documentary is from inside the club as a bevy of men dance on stage in and out of their underwear, with the other half consisting of interviews with a few of 60+ guys who take off their clothes at Swinging Richards. [Read more…]

Flatbush Luck (US DVD Review) – Insider trading and a gay realisation in Brooklyn

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Casper Andreas has made a name for himself with gay-themed movies such as Between Love & Goodbye, The Big Gay Musical, Going Down In La La Land and Kiss Me Kill Me. He’s back with his eighth feature, Flatbush Luck, which doesn’t put gay themes quite as much at the forefront as some of his other movies, although he certainly hasn’t abandoned them entirely.

Jimmy (Tanner Novlan) and his cousin Max (Robby Stahl) are best friends, and both of them work for the telephone company fixing the lines. Jimmy used to work on Wall Street but is going through a rough patch – hence the repairman job – and he’s also having women troubles both because of his change in social position and his rather libidinous ways. Max meanwhile is dealing with a pushy, manipulative fiancé who’s angling for a massive, expensive wedding that he can’t afford and doesn’t want. [Read more…]

You Can’t Escape Lithuania (DVD Review) – A gay filmmaker goes on the run

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You Can’t Escape Lithuania became a bit of a viral sensation when filmmaker Romas Zabarauskas promised naked pictures of himself to anyone who donated more than $50 during a crowdfunding campaign. It’s difficult not to wonder whether it’s the film’s notoriety that came from that bit of self-promotion that got it a DVD release, as the film itself isn’t exactly great.

The movie immediately gets rather self-referential when a radio host talks about the naked picture stunt during the film’s opening. However, it’s not a documentary, as while it’s about a character called Romas Zabarauskas, he’s played by an actor, Denisas Kolomyckis. Nor is he playing the real Romas, as the character is a mixture of the real and the made up, where we’re deliberately not meant to know where the truth ends and fiction begins. [Read more…]