★★★★★ A mesmerizing “Come as You Are” meetcute between Drew Starkey and Daniel Craig, Queer should have been a major awards contender at the most recent Academy Awards. Written by Justin Kuritzkes and directed by Luca Guadagnino—notably, the second 2024 title from that exact same team after the masterful Challengers—this unique drama takes inspiration from … Continue reading Blu-Ray Film Review: Queer
SFFILM 2025: The Last First Time
★★★★ Erotically charged and rippling with unspoken subtext, The Last First Time is one of the year's best queer festival surprises. Hailing from Mexican director Rafael Ruiz Espejo, Alejandro Quintana plays eighteen-year-old Eduardo in a rather unflinching character study. LGBT+ audiences will no doubt relate to the simplicity of this feature more than others. It … Continue reading SFFILM 2025: The Last First Time
Film Review: On Swift Horses
★★★★★ Jacob Elordi and Diego Calva starring in a gay film together was enough to set the internet ablaze. Would this decade-spanning drama be worth the wait? Thankfully, there is much more depth to On Swift Horses than just saucy screenshots. Director Daniel Minahan (Netflix's Hollywood, Showtime's Fellow Travelers) and screenwriter Bryce Kass (Lizzie) adapt … Continue reading Film Review: On Swift Horses
Film Review: The Parenting
★★★★ Meeting the parents can be truly killer for any relationship, let alone a gay one with all its unconventional intricacies. What happens when a haunted house and demonic possession are thrown into the mix? Enter: The Parenting, hatched from a delicious collaboration between director Craig Johnson (The Skeleton Twins, Alex Strangelove) and screenwriter Ken … Continue reading Film Review: The Parenting
Film Review: Pet Shop Days
★★★ Part coming-of-age queer romance, part baffling crime drama, Pet Shop Days premiered all the way back at 2023's Venice Film Festival. Since then, it has bounced around from festival to festival, evading me at every turn despite my voracious hunger to consume LGBT content. Finally, Olmo Schnabel's directorial debut has arrived in all its … Continue reading Film Review: Pet Shop Days
SXSW 2025: Fucktoys
★★★★ A depraved feminine-driven journey through a 16mm dreamscape, Fucktoys loudly announces the arrival of writer/director/lead actress Annapurna Sriram. Expect grimy aesthetics, hilarious cameos, and plenty of bodily fluids—for AP (Sriram), that is just another average day in Trashtown. The mesmerizing cinematography and vignette nature of the narrative structure are accompanied by gross-out humor and … Continue reading SXSW 2025: Fucktoys
Berlinale 2025: Sandbag Dam
★★★ Croatian gay drama Sandbag Dam initially caught my attention amongst the Berlin Film Festival lineup, as its premise deeply resonated with me on a personal level. Coming-of-age films in the queer space have many similarities typically, leaning into familiar tropes, coming out scenarios, homophobia from peers, and often tragic endpoints. What sets Sandbag Dam … Continue reading Berlinale 2025: Sandbag Dam
SBIFF 2025: Fine Young Men
★★★★ Examining toxic masculinity through the lens of high school parties has been attempted many a time. For writer/director Alejandro Andrade, his feature Fine Young Men finds an enthralling way to newly frame that conceit through the eyes of internalized homophobia and chilling privilege. This unflinching drama plainly examines its closeted lead character in all … Continue reading SBIFF 2025: Fine Young Men
Sundance 2025: Sauna
★★★ As our lead, Johan (Magnus Juhl Andersen), steps into a seedy and mysterious gay sauna right in the opening scene, the aptly-titled Sauna wastes no time emphasizing the importance of its locale. Based on the novel by Mads Ananda Lodahl, it would be remiss to leave out that there are some heavy themes, and … Continue reading Sundance 2025: Sauna
PSIFF 2025: A Nice Indian Boy
★★★★ Director Roshan Sethi's debut feature film, 7 Days—also a collaboration with lead star Karan Soni—was notable for using 2020's worldwide pandemic as a launching point for its rom-com trappings. A Nice Indian Boy fully embraces queer romantic comedy territory, establishing Sethi as a reliable force in this eternal subgenre. With Soni at the center, … Continue reading PSIFF 2025: A Nice Indian Boy