In the midst of contemporary London, Adam (played by Andrew Scott) experiences a serendipitous meeting with his enigmatic neighbour, Harry (portrayed by Paul Mescal), one night in his sparsely populated tower block. This encounter disrupts Adam’s usual routine, leading to the blossoming of a relationship between them. However, Adam becomes consumed by memories of the past, prompting him to revisit the suburban town of his upbringing and his childhood home. There, he is confronted with a perplexing discovery: his parents (depicted by Claire Foy and Jamie Bell) seem to be frozen in time, inhabiting their lives exactly as they were thirty years earlier, on the day of their tragic demise.
This award-winning and Sundance Festival-selected film is an intricate look at the lives of two men who enter into a relationship in 90s New York.
Erik is a Danish documentary film-maker who meets Paul via a telephone chat-line. Erik is anxious about commitment and lawyer Paul has a steady girlfriend. What starts off as a casual sexual relationship develops into something more meaningful and romantic. The film charts the two lovers throughout their turbulent ten-year relationship.
The two main characters’ lives take on unexpected turns and as Erik becomes more responsible and committed, Paul’s more orderly life spirals out of control as his recreational drug abuse becomes a destructive habit. The relationship enters a series of cycles of damage and renewal as the film charts their lives.
The film is beautiful to watch but also painful to view in places, but ultimately provides a meaningful glimpse into the areas of both lightness and shade which relationships can pass through. The balance of the film is such that the story never feels too bleak but is balanced with erotic tension, a compelling storyline and occasional bursts of humour. Strong performances from the cast add to the emotional intensity of the film.
Highly recommended for a moving and fascinating insight into the life cycle of a relationship.
A newly married French gay couple journey to America to find a surrogate in the moving documentary ‘Ghosts of the Republique.’
It was love at first sight for Aurelien and Nicolas when they meet at a gay club in Paris. They wind up getting married and such begins the film and their journey. It’s 2014 and estate agent Nicolas and flight attendant Aurelien make a perfect couple, while both their parents have accepted the fact that their gay sons would never be parents. Even Nicolas’s mother is happy to now have two sons but upset that she’ll never be happy as she’ll never have a grandchild.
However, Aurelien and Nicolas do want to have a child, but they face serious obstacles – the most difficult one being that the French government does not allow surrogacy. It’s a government that passed same-sex marriage in 2013 but is not quite progressive enough. Aurelien and Nicolas are so determined to be parents that they fly to Las Vegas to start a family of their own through international surrogacy. They search high and low for an egg donor and also a surrogate to carry the egg to produce a child. They interview several local women, make decisions, and proceed with the process.
It’s a process that’s complex, full of loopholes and uncertainty, and where every step has to go perfect and according to plan. Getting their non-French born baby back into France and establishing French citizenship is another hurdle to tackle. We go through the highs and the lows with Aurelien and Nicolas in the documentary – it’s an emotional ride made bearable by the charming couple who desperately want a baby, and we see them travel back and forth from France to the US several times to check in their baby mama.
Ghosts of the Republique, directed by American Jonathon Narducci, provides us with much joy and drama in this sweet and touching story of Aurelien and Nicolas.
Ghosts of the Republique is now available on Amazon Prime, iTunes and other platforms.
David France is quickly becoming one of the best documentary filmmakers of our generation.
In 2012 he brought us the riveting How to Survive a Plague – about the early years of the AIDS epidemic and the ACT UP activists who fought for their lives. Then came 2017’s The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson, about a well-loved drag queen and gay activist who was found dead off the West Side Piers in Manhattan in 1992. Now he brings us another important documentary for and about the LGBT community – Welcome to Chechnya.
The film follows David Isteev, who along with the Russian LGBT Network, helps gays and lesbians escape from Chechnya, a country where, in 2017, its government started a gay purge where over 100 men were (allegedly) detained and subject to torture, with many being murdered. This had kicked off because in February 2017 a gay Chechen man had been arrested for drug offences and arresting officers discovered contact information for other gay men on his phone. These men were caught, and they, in turn, turned over more names to the authorities, escalating to a point of crisis. But not only were these gay men subject to arrest and torture, Lesbians were also subject to the same fate.
In the documentary, David attempts, by all means, to free ‘Anya’ who is seeking help because her uncle has threatened to tell her father, who is a high-ranking Chechyan government official, that she is a Lesbian if she doesn’t have sex with him.
But the focus of this harrowing documentary is the Moscow safe house where these refugees are taken to temporary accommodation to play the waiting game until a country, any country, can take them in. The focus of the documentary is our hero 30-year-old Grisha. He was arrested and tortured in Chechnya but managed to escape, and left the country. But it left his family vulnerable to the authorities so they, in turn, were smuggled out of the country into a safe house.
Grisha is reunited with his boyfriend ‘Bogdan’ in scenes that are emotional and loving – these two men really care and love each other. But Grisha doesn’t want to remain silent and anonymous the rest of his life, he wants to come out publicly to expose the Chechnyan Government for the atrocities they inflicted on not just him but on perhaps what could be hundreds of victims.
The film also introduces us to the brave Olga Baranova, who helps the refugees in the safe house with any and all that they need. She is like a mom (she herself has a young son) to the occupants.
While Anya is successfully smuggled out of the country, she is placed in an apartment and told not to go out – but after three months it appears that she is getting extremely restless and very lonely.
Meanwhile Grisha and his family are quickly moved to another country after suspicious people knock on their door and threaten to come back the next day. It’s harrowing, and director France was very fortunate to have not only Grisha’s family but the others allow him to film them in, at times, situations that could’ve exposed them. Some airport scenes, filmed undercover, are nail biting.
All of the subjects in the film have had their faces digitally disguised to protect them. This is such the fear that they have. While Chechnya technically is a federal republic of Russia, it appears to have self and independent rule by Ramzan Kadyrov, who appears to have waged an operation to ‘cleanse the blood’ of LGBT Chechens. He is shown in interviews in the documentary denying there are any LGBT people in his country. But he is shown in a photo with Zelim Bakaev, a Chechen pop-singer, who, in August 2017 disappeared after going back to Chechnya to attend his sister’s wedding. His mother has demanded justice but the government has not even started an investigation. He is presumed dead.
France’s access to these people is just incredible. Also incredible is that over two years, the Russian LGBT Network has managed to resettle 151 people fleeing Chechnya, many of them coming through the shelter. Welcome to Chechnya is an important documentary not just for our community but for the world to know what exactly takes place in Chechnya to our own people.
Welcome to Chechnya
In Russian, Chechen and English with English subtitles Not rated Running time: 1 hour, 47 minutes Playing: 8 p.m. June 30 on HBO; also available on HBO Now and HBO Max BBC iPlayer.
It’s 1981 South Africa, a time when the country was still at the height of apartheid, and blacks were not the only class of people who were discriminated against, homosexuals didn’t have it easy either.
In the new amazing film ‘Moffie’ – based on an autobiographical novel by Andre Carl van der Merwe – beautifully tells the story of a young man called Nicholas (Kai Luke Brummer – wonderful), a teenager, who, with no choice, is sent to complete his compulsory military service. But Nicholas is not your boy next door – he’s gay, and not at all out of the closet. So he has to endure two years of military service in a system that spits up and chews out young men and turns them into hardened soldiers, hardened men. It’s a culture full of testosterone and machismo. And while Nicholas doesn’t let his secret out, he falls in love with another young soldier Dylan (Ryan de Villiers). In fact, it was Dylan who initiates, and Nicholas, while a bit nervous during their first encounter, soon finds being with Nicholas very natural. But some soldiers do no adjust very well to army life (one soldier shoots himself in the head), while Dylan is sent away for unknown reasons, leaving Nicholas to endure his remaining time in the service, while still pining for Dylan, and still a moffie (faggot in the Afrikaans language).
‘Moffie’ – which was called a masterpiece by Variety Magazine – is indeed an excellent film. Director Oliver Hermanus hits all the right notes, from Nicholas’ family life prior to going into the army (his father gives him a stack of straight porno magazines), to the daily brutality he and his fellow recruits get from their Major, to the barracks scenes where the tension is palpable and tense, which is what you have when a couple dozen young men are all bunking down in the same room. But the scene when Nicholas, as a young boy, is with his parents at a public swimming pool, and he looks longingly at an older boy in the showers but is then exposed and scolded by an adult shower attendant in one amazing long shot will have you holding your breathe – it’s quite a very dramatic scene and excellently done. And at 104 minutes, ‘Moffie’ is quite a movie. Don’t miss it.
Beautifully shot and superb performances are just a couple of the reasons to go see ‘Portrait of a Lady on Fire.’
In French with English subtitles (and nominated for an Oscar for Best Film in a Foreign Language) ‘Portrait of a Lady on Fire’ is a story about forbidden love set against the backdrop of a very different time and place.
On an isolated island in Brittany in the 1770s, a female painter is hired by the mother of a young woman to paint a portrait of her daughter to send to a prospective husband. Yet Heloise (Adèle Haenel), is not very excited about both the prospect of marriage and of having her portrait painted.
But somehow Marianne (Noemie Merlant) gets Heloise to warm to her, to pose gracefully, and soon enough they become close, enjoying walks on the beach, and time at Heloise’s stately home – more so when her mother leaves the house in order to give Marianne the freedom to paint. Marianne and Heloise start a love affair gently, softly, emotionally, and naturally – as it was bound to happen. Director and writer Céline Sciamma (‘Tomboy’ and ‘Girlhood’) elicits true passion from her actors without revealing too much in a film that’s original, romantic, thoughtful, wistful, and will leave you thinking about it for days after you’ve seen it.
It’s a truly remarkable film that’s won lots of awards and was selected to compete for the Palme d’Or at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, winning the Queer Palm there. Sciamma also won the award for Best Screenplay at Cannes.
Yes it’s true about all the hype surrounding the South Korean film Parasite – it’s funny, dramatic, and very very different, and it sticks to you like, well, a parasite.
Director Bong Joon-ho, who wrote the screenplay with Han Jin-won, tells the tale of the Kim family, who are all unemployed (they attempt to get a job folding pizza boxes but fail miserably) and live in a ground floor basement apartment where locals relieve themselves right outside their window. They also steal Wifi connections from neighbors.
The son, Kim-woo (Choi Woo-shik) gets a job tutoring the daughter of the wealthy Park family who live in an architecturally stunning home. And soon enough, the daughter, Ki-jeong (a brilliant Park So-dam) poses as Kim-woo’s friend ‘Jessica’ who is then hired to be an art therapist for the Parks’ young son. And then eventually the father (Song Kang-ho) and the mother (Chang Hyae-jin) get jobs in the Park household as well, infiltrating the Parks’ home and their lives, like an organism (parasite). But their good luck just about comes to an end when the former Park housekeeper (whose job the mother stole) comes back to check on what she left behind (it’s quite a surprise!), and it’s then that the Kim family ruse starts to be discovered and it all slowly starts to unravel, especially when the Parks come back home early from a rained out vacation.
It’s such an extraordinary tale that could only come from the man who gave us The Host (where a monster kidnaps a young girl), and Okja (where a young girl raises a large pig).’ Joon-ho elicits great performances from all of his cast, especially the younger actors of the Kim family – they are all very dastardly in their lies, and the Park family wife (Cho Yeo-jeong), who is oblivious to what is happening in her very own home.
Winner of the Palme d’Or at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival as well as two BAFTA Awards (Best Original Screenplay and Best Film Not in the English Language), and nominated for 6 Academy Awards, Parasite is truly one of the best films of the year – it’s a dark comedy that’s very very dark – and delicious.
An Adam Sandler movie connotes bad acting and a stupid plot. Not ‘Uncut Gems’ – it’s fast, furious, heart-pounding and brilliant. Shockingly and shamelessly ‘Uncut Gems’ has been ignored by the people who give out film awards – its Sandlers’ best film ever as well as one of the years top movies.
The action and plot in ‘Uncut Gems’ builds and accelerates into hyperdrive – a feeling probably akin to being on meth with the high becoming more and more intense until an explosive ending.
Sandler plays Manhattan gem dealer Harold Ratner, a man known to place a few bets in his time. He comes across a rare black opal which he wants to sell for a big score. But it’s not as easy as it sounds. Other people (criminals) also want their hands on the opal, meanwhile, Ratner owes money to loan sharks, he’s been cheating on his wife (Idina Menzel) with his sexy and saucy mistress who is his assistant in the jewellery shop (Julia Fox). Also involved is a professional basketball player dangling lots of money in his face to spend on jewellery. Combining all this and what you have is a man whose life is spiralling out of control to a point where it’s do or die for Ratner.
To say Sandler is brilliant is an understatement. I saw this film last year at the BFI London Film Festival and didn’t know what to expect going in. When I left the cinema 135 minutes later, my head was spinning and my mind took hours to process what I had just seen. The ending is such a crescendo it’s so unlike anything you’d expect from a Sandler movie.
Directors (and brothers) Benny and Josh Safdie (who did the award-winning 2017 film Good Time starring Robert Pattison), with a script by both of them (and Ronald Bronstein), bring us a superb film that’s thrilling, intense, and will have you on the edge of your seat. And while all the cast is brilliant, Uncut Gems is Sandlers’ movie.
Go see it just for him, and expect the ending to just blow your mind.
‘Uncut Gems’ is on Netflix but is also currently playing in cinemas.
A contemporary romantic drama starring Laia Costa and Josh O’Connor, from first-time filmmaker Harry Wootliff. ‘Only You’ was shown as part of the London Film Festival’s First Feature Competition.
Elena (Laia Costa), 35, and Jake (Josh O’Connor, from the gay-must-watch film, God’s Own Country), 26, meet by chance on New Year’s Eve, fighting for the same taxi. But, instead of going their separate ways after a shared ride, they start a passionate relationship. Within weeks they are living together, and not long after they talk about starting a family. But, as the seasons pass, reality catches up with them. Falling in love was the easy part, but can they remain in love when life doesn’t give them everything they hoped for? It’s as realistic a love story as you can get – and both Costa and O’Connor are electrifying.
‘ONLY YOU’ is now in Cinemas and On Demand by Curzon
Julianne Moore is simply fabulous as a middle-aged woman going through the motions in the new film Gloria Bell.
Moore, who excels in every role she plays, is particularly good here in a film that is a remake of the 2013 film Gloria. With the same director, Sebastian Lelio, this Gloria is more nuanced and, with Moore as it’s lead (Paulina Garcia played Gloria in the original film, and won lots of awards), takes this version to another level.
Gloria is a 53-year old divorced woman living in Los Angeles. She’s an insurance broker with two adult children, one son who just had a baby with a wife who has gone away to ‘find herself’, and a daughter who is getting ready to move to Sweden to be with her boyfriend.
Gloria willingly attends singles events in the hopes of finding a new man; she’s very attractive and stable, so it should be easy for her to find a quality man.
She meets Arnold (John Turturro), who appears to be 100% available at the beginning of their relationship but somehow is tied to an umbilical cord to his two adult daughters, and leaves Gloria, literally, in situations she never thought she would find herself in. But nothing else much happens in Gloria Bell. We see her driving around and singing along to the radio, a cat that somehow keeps finding it’s way into her apartment, and an upstairs neighbor who is a bit schizophrenic. But it’s the grace and allure in which Moore plays Gloria that is both mesmerizing and alluring. Moore is very good in these types of small roles (see ‘Still Alice,’ ‘What Maisie Knew,’ and ‘Freeheld’).
She literally guides us through this film in one of her best ever performances. But it’s at the end of the film, where the camera is squarely focused on Gloria, who is a guest at a wedding. She gets up and dances with herself, a bit sad that she’s alone, but content, and dancing to the tune of Laura Branigans’ 1992 song ‘Gloria.’ It’s an image that lingers with you long after you’ve left the cinema.
Probably the most anticipated film of all time is now the most successful film in cinema history. The immediate sequel to Avengers Infinity War and the climax to the hugely successful decade of Marvel Comics 22 film marathon. After the shocking climax of the last movie with the Avengers losing big time, what next? Who lives and dies this time? And how do they send off the most beloved characters in film history?
Answer with the best superhero film ever made that’s how!
Nutshell – The ultimate superhero villain Thanos succeeded in gathering together all six infinity stones which have been spread across all of the decades’ superhero films and with a click of his fingers kills half of the universe including favourites such as Black Panther, Spiderman and almost all of The Guardians Of The Galaxy. How does the world, the universe and the remaining Avenger superheroes cope with the loss and go forward? All seems lost as this is set 5 years depressingly in the future but then…
This film will make you laugh out loud, cheer, cry and give you loads to talk about through repeated viewings. Simply spine-tingling and incredible at a number of key moments. Believe the hype for once.
Running Time – 181 Minutes – Cert 12A. A very very long movie but there are 10 years of loose ends and story arcs to tie up and they succeed with each one with pure class.
The Gay UK Factor – Gay cosplay heaven. Chris’s Hemsworth, Pratt & Evans lead the wank bank possibilities here plus Black Panther, Hawkeye and a superb buff looking Bucky Barnes The Winter Soldier will all make your hole twitch. Chris Evans, unfortunately, shaves his beard off from Infinity ward which is a big shame but at least he does it shirtless. Another jerk-off negative is Chris Hemsworth’s Thor for reasons that become apparent when you see the film but there is a tonne of male flesh squeezing into tight latex for three very happy hours plus more than one reference to Captain America’s ass being the ‘ass of America’ to enjoy too… and it sure is.
Cast – For the first time ever there are 25 names above the movie title. This is very very star heavy. Robert Downey Jnr has the top slot but with 16 other movie headliners of their own and an army of cameos including Robert Redford, Michael Douglas, William Hurt & Michelle Pfeiffer plus all the usual Marvel suspects you won’t be shortchanged in star power for your hard earned.
Key Player – This is the new dictionary definition of the word ensemble so no point singling out anyone except Thor and Rocket racoon get all the best funny lines and Hawkeye the best action beats. The real key players are the directors here Joe and Anthony Russo who pull off whichever way you look at it – the fourth Avenger sequel or the 22nd Marvel Universe sequel and make it the best yet. Giving every member of the massive cast something worthwhile to do and tying up so many stories so satisfactorily. The other key player is the God at Marvel/Disney Kevin Feige who oversees all and is the one who decided to make so many different movies linked with each other over so many years and three chapters of the Marvel Universe which comes to a close here so onto Chapter Four in a couple of months with the next Tom Holland Spidey film.
Budget – $400,000,000 plus – Yes, the most expensive film in history but after four days it had made $1.2 Billion dollars so this was no gamble. Bonus’s all round as it climbs the All-Time Box Office Charts with gusto leaping over Frozen, Fast & Furious and Toy Story by the hour. Marvel now move on to stage four of their universe so expect even bigger budgets and profits to come.
Best Bit – 2 hr 12 mins; A big turning point in the movie which we will not spoil for you but you won’t miss it just ensure you are not holding any popcorn at the time.
Worst Bit – 1 hr 49 mins; When you are now bursting for the toilet but there is so much going on you cannot decide when to make a run for it. By the way unusual for a Marvel film but there are no scenes in the credits at all so no need to sit through 10 minutes of CGI and stunt men’s names this time… go to the bar and start the lengthy discussion about what you have just seen instead.
Little Secret – The film held previews on a Thursday night and two websites crashed and all seats in America were sold in SIX hours flat. Three Cinema chains decided for the first time ever to open right through the night and continue 24/7 to deal with demand.
It made $60 Million at its previews breaking all records and next day it broke more than the biggest weekend box office ever and so it goes clearing $1 Billion dollars on the 4th day (which only 3 films have done in history). Demand was so high that two tickets in New Jersey were sold for $15,000 for an IMAX showing of the 15 buck movie. This review took a day to write and in that time Endgame made more than any non-Marvel release of 2018 did in its entire run.
Further Viewing – Really? Well, you need to buff up on all 22 films in the Marvel Universe starting with Iron Man in 2008. Then move on to the DC Universe back through Nolan’s Dark Knights and onto Tim Burton’s Batman’s & Christopher Reeves first two Superman films. Add The Crow and Blade and then ignore all other superhero films like the plague especially anything with the words Fantastic and Four in them.
Any Good – This is a masterpiece with one jaw-dropping air punching moment after another. Probably the biggest superstar cast ever assembled each with their own moment in the most expensive movie in history and a last hour that will not be beaten this year or possibly for many years.
Bye, bye Avatar, so long Titanic, Au Revoir Star Wars, Pirates, Bond and Potter the world has a new all-time box office champ and we have no hesitation in giving it five huge stars to boot.
You hoped it would be great but it is 10 times better than you ever expected. There was the movie world before Endgame and a completely different and better one after. Everything is wrapped up perfectly making an instant classic. Just incredible!
