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

REVIEWS

Cinema, DVD and Blu-ray reviews

Pride (Blu-ray Review)

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For many people Pride was one of the best films of 2014, if not the best. It’s well made, genuinely funny, angry, smart and heartfelt; and while tinged with tragedy, overall it’s astonishingly uplifting.

It’s the early 1980s and the National Union Of Miners is on strike due to theThatcher government’s decision to close a number of coal pits. The strike is dragging on and the nation is divided, including in London where a group of gays and lesbians decide to come together to raise cash for the miners. There’s a problem though, as when they try to donate the cash they find out that the Union and various other groups don’t want to take the money as they’d preferred not to be associated with a bunch of ‘poofs’. Although LGSM (Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners) could donate anonymously, de facto group leader Mark (Ben Schnetzer) is determined that gay people raised the cash and they should be able to donate without hiding their sexuality. [Read more…]

Appropriate Behavior (Cinema Review)

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Appropriate Behavior is a proper audience divider. Desiree Akhavan’s Shirin is narcissistic, self-obsessed and shallow, but convinced she’s deep, complex and misunderstood. However, how you take the film depends on how self-aware you think it is. Is it on Shirin’s side and lauding the life of the tragically hip, or is it well aware of her shortcomings and essentially satirising it?

I’d safely say it’s the latter, but I can see why have assumed the former, as the film’s humour is dry as a bone and so it’s not too shocking some viewers have missed it. [Read more…]

WTC View (VoD Review)

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There aren’t many films that set out to capture a moment in time the way WTC View does. Set shortly after 9/11, the movie (and the play its based on) attempts to capture the fear, paranoia, anger, sadness, confusion and hope that came to those in New York after the towers came down.

A pre-Ugly Betty Michael Urie plays Eric, a young gay man who lives in an apartment that until a few weeks before enjoyed a view of the World Trade Center. He’s now broken up with his boyfriend and his roommate is gone, and Eric needs to find someone else to share his apartment with as soon as he can. While normally that wouldn’t be a problem, with everything in flux, finding a roomie proves difficult. [Read more…]

Playing It Cool (VoD Review)

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It’s not often that a movie with this much star power doesn’t get a cinema release in the UK, but Playing It Cool has gone straight to VoD, despite the presence of Chris Evans, Michelle Monaghan, Topher Grace, Aubrey Plaza, Luke Wilson, Patrick Warbuton, Matthew Morrison, Ioan Gruffudd, Ashley Tisdale, Anthony Mackie and Phillip Baker Hall, amongst others.

So is there something wrong with it? Well, there’s nothing really bad, but its problem is that it has a lot of ambition but doesn’t quite hit any of its marks. Even so it’s a surprise it hasn’t been in cinemas.

Chris Evans plays a screenwriter who has little interest in the romantic comedy script he’s been commissioned to write, largely because he’s not a big believer in love. With every relationship he’s had, he’s ended up telling the woman he doesn’t feel the same way she does, and he’s now essentially trying to avoid the whole thing. But then he meets Michelle Monaghan, and there’s definitely a connection. [Read more…]

Mr. Turner (Blu-ray Review)

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Mr. Turner is one of those films that ought to be interminable. It doesn’t follow a traditional plot, just showing you things happening to the famed painter Joseph William Mallord Turner in the last quarter century of his life. However it possesses a surprising charming, which is even more impressive when you consider the 150 minute running time.

While it may not be plot heavy, that’s not to say it lacks incident, with Turner loved by some, loved by others and living a life that is part high society, part working class and part living by the rules of his own desires. He is profoundly affected by his father’s death, and for a mid 19th Century man possesses an attitude to women that ranges from extremely forward-thinking to the extremely base – working with a female natural scientist but simultaneously taking sexual advantage of his servant – before ending up secretly living with a woman he never marries. [Read more…]

Love, Rosie (Blu-ray Review)

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It’s interesting to see sometimes how different critic and audience reactions can be. Love, Rosie currently has a very good 7.4/10 rating on IMDB from audience votes, but an abysmal 21% on RottenTomatoes from critics.

When you watch the film you can understand the disparity. If you’re a movie aficionado the whole thing is rather tedious – it’s by-the-numbers  to the point of feeling like it was just spewed out of a machine. The characters we’ve seen 10,000 times before and while the idea of exploring whether people who’ve been friends since childhood can become a successful adult couple has potential, it’s handled in a way that’s doesn’t have a vaguely original idea. All that is anathema to critics but many audience members like it – after all it’s why places like McDonald’s are so successful, you know exactly what you’re going to get and there’s comfort in that, even if gourmands may hate it. [Read more…]

Nightcrawler (Blu-ray Review)

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I’m not entirely sure why Jake Gyllenhaal felt the need to lose loads of weight for Nightcrawler, but conbined with a very good performance he certainly looks the part of a man who’s one step away from being a psychopath – and maybe not even one step.

He is Louis Bloom, who’s certainly not lacking in confidence and believes he’s got everything to offer the world, but his life and career is going nowhere, partly because he lacks direction and also because he had no issue being on the edge of the law. However he stumbles into a career he never expected when he meets a Nightcrawler – freelance cameramen who race to emergencies in the hope of getting sensationalist footage for the local news. [Read more…]

Backstreet Boys: Show ‘Em What You’re Made Of (Cinema Review)

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Well done making me feel old Backstreet Boys. It was recently their 20th anniversary, which makes me feel ancient, as I can remember when they were the new kids on the block (who were constantly compared to the New Kids Of The Block). This documentary was made as part of the celebration of that milestone, as well as to chronicle a new page in the Boys’ book, with the return of Kevin Richardson to the group, along with a new album and tour.

It’s the sort of documentary project that could have been far too laudatory and vain for its own good, but it turns out Show ‘Em What You’re Made Of is much more interesting than that. The film mixes showing us what is happening with the boys as they record their new album – including some major bust-ups and Brian having massive issues with his voice – with the history of the band. [Read more…]

Effie Gray (DVD Review)

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Effie Gray is a genuinely fascinating character and one day there will be a brilliant film made about her, but despite vast amounts of effort and some interesting touches, this movie isn’t it.

At 19-years-old Effie (Dakota Fanning) marries the older John Ruskin (Greg Wise), a prominent art critic who’s seen as a very good match. However soon after the wedding problems begin to appear, as while she wishes to be a proper wife, John controlling parents (Julie Walters and David Suchet) prevent her from helping her husband with his domestic affairs, and he himself refuses to consummate their marriage. [Read more…]

Global Warming (DVD Review)

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Global Warming is a collection of four short films from director Reid Waterer which are loosely linked by taking us around the world – more literally than metaphorically. They are only loosely tied together as they were originally made as completely separate shorts, but have been brought together for this release.

‘You Can’t Curry Love’ follows a young Anglo-Asian man who goes on a business trip to India and ends up falling for a local man while immersing himself in the local culture, both LGBT and otherwise. While India is a world away from the place he grew up in, he must make a difficult decision about whether it’s where his future lies. [Read more…]