THEGAYUK

Tag: LGBT Movie Review

Read the latest LGBT+ film reviews from THEGAYUK.

  • FILM REVIEW | How To Survive A Plague

    ★★★★★ | How To Survive A Plague

    “Never has so much been owed by so many to so few.” These are the words of Sir Winston Churchill, referring to the efforts of the Royal Air Force pilots fighting the Battle of Britain in 1940, but they are also the words that sprang into my mind after watching David France’s brilliant documentary How To Survive A Plague.

    It tells the story of a small group of men and women, most of them HIV positive, who battled against government indifference and departmental incompetence, to save their own lives. In so doing they helped save the lives of 6.000,000.

    This is a great piece of film-making that documents the courage and determination of these people in the face of appalling obstacles from a government that couldn’t give a damn. The overriding message from the Reagan, and then the Bush administration, was that gay people didn’t matter, that AIDS was a result of bad lifestyle choices, and that we deserved it.

    Using archive footage, we are given stark reminders of the shock tactics they used to bring their plight to the attention of the world, culminating in the display of the 8,288 panels of the AIDS quilt in 1988, and the march on the White House, when relatives and lovers of the dead scattered the ashes of their loved ones onto the White House lawn. These were the days when funeral parlours refused the bodies of people who had died of AIDS, when hospital security guards barred AIDS patients from entering emergency wards.

    Dark times indeed, chillingly brought to life again in the newsreel footage we see in this movie. But anger alone was not going to be enough to win the battle. We learn how these activists became scientists, taking on an intense study of virology, immunology, pharmacology and cellular biology in an attempt to help direct the global research effort.

    Sadly, not all of the activists lived long enough to see the fruits of their labour; to see AIDS (or HIV) become a manageable condition, as it is today. Of those that did, the charismatic Peter Staley emerges as the undoubted star. Given just 18 months to live at the age of 26, he is galvanised into fighting for his life, and there is no doubt that his eloquence (not to mention his youthful good looks) helped spearhead the campaign.

    David France tells this story clearly and unflinchingly, putting us right at the heart of the battle, the occasional heartbreak at failure and the euphoria surrounding success; even the internal rifts and skirmishes. Gripping, moving, inspiring, at times emotionally draining, it is a story that demands to be told. Required viewing for every gay man, particularly those under the age of 30, I recommend it absolutely. We owe our lives to these people. Surely the rest of us can spare them 110 minutes of our time.

     

    Available to buy / view on: Amazon | Amazon Prime |

  • FILM REVIEW | Bridegroom

    FILM REVIEW | Bridegroom

    Inspired by Shane Bitney Crone’s viral YouTube video, It Could Happen To You; a young and in love gay couple’s story has been turned into a full-length documentary film, written and directed by Linda Bloodworth-Thomason.

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  • FILM REVIEW | I Do

    I followed the twitter feed on this movie well before it finally arrived on my doorstep to review. David W Ross, the star and force behind the movie, has an engaging twitter presence – playing on his good looks and obvious talent, and witty banter.

    David is a former member of ’90’s boyband Bad Boys Inc and no stranger to the spotlight. Here, he takes on the role of a Brit abroad in New York, living an almost ideal life with his brother, American sister-in-law and a good job/loft/sex life – basically, the good life.

    This is shattered, and I’m not going into details as its one of the films best and most unexpected moments. The film then goes on to investigate what happens when your life is torn apart, only to have it further complicated by eminent deportation. It reviews the bureaucracy surrounding green cards, sham marriages and real love. What happens when your best lesbian friend agrees to marry you so you can stay in the country and shoulder your supposed responsibilities, only to turn jealous when you find true love in the shape of a gorgeous spanish architect?

    The film isn’t a gritty docu-drama, it’s far to good looking for that, it doesn’t do a warts an all expose of sham marriages for green cards, it’s too engaging for that – David has managed to do a balancing act of making a film that highlights issues but is still a bloody good story, and cinematic too.

    The film captures New York and makes it almost another character, the people, the streets, the apartments… for those of us this side of the pond, it all feels familiar enough but we can empathise with the “Englishman in New York” syndrome.

     

    BUY ON AMAZON | BUY ON iTunes

  • FILM REVIEW | Leave It On The Floor

    If, like me, you’re a sucker for a musical about voguing set in LA, with a mainly unknown cast and containing some catchy tunes you’ve never heard of – this is the movie for you!

    The music is original, with the tittle track being one of the strongest – but wait till you hear the ode to JT, Justin’s Gonna Call… .made me smile! This film also wins the award for most original use of a bowling alley, and a fake pregnancy…. by a man…

    It has laughs, drama, dancing, tight vests, jaunty hats and fierce Gaga-esque outfits…

    Treat yourself – I defy you to not be tapping your toes at least to one or two of these little numbers. As with most musicals, its difficult to engage with the characters, they can seem quite superficial or two-dimensional, but that doesn’t stop this being a celebratory movie about being yourself and being, for want of a better line, born this way…

    The film is written by Glenn Gaylord, who also directed the movie “I Do“, which I’ll be reviewing nearer its DVD release date later this month.

    Available to buy / view on: Amazon | Amazon Prime | iTunes

  • FILM REVIEW | Bashment

    Developed from his original stage show, director Rickki Beadle-Blair explores the controversial subjects of class, racism and homophobia in dance hall music in this contemporary urban drama. (more…)

  • FILM REVIEW| I Want Your Love

    ★★★★ | I Want Your Love is collaborative film between gay porn studio NakedSword and independent filmmaker Travis Mathews.

    Jesse is an aspiring artist who feels creatively blocked because of the state his finances and his massive amount of debt. After spending the last decade in San Francisco, Jessie decides to move back home to his parents in Ohio, the Midwest to free himself of the financial pressure.

    I Want Your Love is the story of his last weekend in San Francisco with his friends, roommates and ex-lovers coming to his leaving party.

    Sex plays an important role in this film and there are uncensored sex scenes from the start. Sex is used to show character development, intimacy, move the storyline along and the development of friendships: those that start with clear defined boundaries but turn into something more – entering that grey area between friend and lover.

    Whatever type of man you’re into, you’ll find them in this film and I can guarantee that they’ll be in a graphic, all-exposed sex scene. Whether your taste be: bears, twinks, older, younger, white, black, Asian, muscly, ordinary or just an all-around lover of all.

    The film is extremely erotic and at times felt like watching a porn film. There’s even a threesome scene. The obligatory porn “I’m going to come!” scene followed by – well use your imagination, makes several appearances in this film. Arguably the storyline gets lost at times in the incredibly hot, but distracting sex.

    Jesse is completely likeable, relatable and discovers that he’s searching for his true self. Over the course of the weekend, he redefines what it means to him to be an artist, gay, and an adult. However, the ending was a bit of an anti-climax.

    It’s brilliantly directed and shot in a way that makes you feel like your sharing the characters most intimate moments. I Want Your Love is at times: funny, emotionally touching, romantic and sentimental as well as being abundantly horny throughout.

    There were slow scenes of sparse dialogue that were followed by peaks of rampant high-paced sex. There was an annoying character – one who really grated, but luckily he wasn’t in the film much.

    Mathews stated that he wanted to give an ‘honest and relevant’ representation of everyday gay life for men in San Francisco. I’m not from San Francisco so I can’t comment, but if that’s what it is really like – get me on a plane!

    I Want Your Love is the perfect film to watch with your partner or other very close friends – not only thoroughly entertaining, it will give you plenty of ideas in the bedroom department.

    I Want Your Love is available to pre-order/order on Amazon.

  • FILM REVIEW | Mixed Kebab

    Much better is Guy Lee Thys’s movie “Mixed Kebab”, which details the love affair between a closeted Turkish Muslim boy, living with his ex-pat family in Antwerp and a completely out Belgian boy. ★★★

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  • FILM REVIEW | Dream On

    ★ | Dream On

    Dream On has almost too much dialogue, most of it stagily delivered, and betraying its origins in a play.

    Set in the 1980s, it is a tale of two teenage boys coming to terms with their sexuality and falling in love, but has not one whiff of the charm of, say “Beautiful Thing”, also coincidentally originally a stage play.

    The main character, Paul, is initially so gormless, one wonders why the slightly more worldly-wise George even bothers with him. He remains completely without charm throughout the film, though we are expected to believe that he has achieved some sort of transfiguration in the final scenes.

    I remained unconvinced. Well-meaning but way too earnest for its own good, “Dream On” is the directorial debut of Lloyd Eyre-Morgan.

    Available to buy / view on: Amazon

  • FILM REVIEW | Behind The Candelabra

    ★★★★ | Behind The Candelabra

    According to director, Steven Soderbergh, the Hollywood studios refused to finance “Behind the Candelabra”, so it ended up being made as a TV movie by HBO.

    t seems the movie was deemed too gay (post Brokeback Mountain, really?) and so, though it is getting a cinema release here in the UK (out on June 7), in the USA, it will only be seen on television.

    If I’m honest, the movie does rather betray its origins as a TV movie, albeit a very enjoyable one with high production values and excellent performances.

    Production designer Howard Cummings, and set designer Barbara Munch-Cameron went to great pains to ensure the movie looks authentic, and many of the props, the pianos and the cars, are actually ones that Liberace himself owned, found on extensive scavenging trips to various antique dealers and prop buyers; some on loan from the Liberace museum. Liberace’s Las Vegas mansion and Los Angeles penthouse are revealed in all their lavishly over the top, glitzy, rococo splendour and the costumes, by Ellen Mirojnick, are detailed reproductions of ones worn by Liberace and Scott Thorson.

    Not wanting to make a traditional biopic, Soderbergh has concentrated on the period spanning the relationship of Liberace and Thorson, adding a short coda that takes in Liberace’s death from AIDS and his funeral, and is mostly based on Thorson’s book “Behind the Candelabra”. During this period, Thorson gained a lot of weight, then lost it again, and both Liberace and Thorson underwent plastic surgery.

    Even if one knows little about Liberace, the story is a familiar one, basically a celebrity marriage that goes wrong. The end of Liberace’s relationship with Thorson is already there in the beginning. When Thorson first meets Liberace, we also meet Liberace’s current lover, a relationship that has obviously soured, so it is no surprise when the scene is replicated later in the film, this time with a young dancer taking the Thorson role, and Thorson taking the role of the disgruntled lover. There is no doubt about the love and affection the two men have for each other at the beginning of the relationship, but things take a bizarre turn when Liberace decides he would like to adopt Thorson, and asks Thorson to undergo plastic surgery to make him look more like Liberace’s younger self.

    Having settled into domestic bliss, they have both gained weight, and the idea comes to him after Liberace sees himself on TV on the Jonny Carson show, declaring he looks like his father in drag. He enlists the help of Dr Jack Startz, a plastic surgeon and dietician (brilliantly played by Rob Lowe, with a completely immobile face). Quite how the make-up department achieved the amazing before and after transformations I am not sure, but they have done so brilliantly.

    Soderbegh’s direction is not always sure footed, and the film drags a little in the middle, which might be less noticeable in the context of a TV movie. He does however get wonderful performances out of his all star cast. Aside from the aforementioned Rob Lowe, there are some great cameos from Dan Ackroyd, Scott Bakula and Debbie Reynolds (remember her?), but the movie succeeds or fails on the work of its two stars, and both Michael Douglas and Matt Damon give faultless performances. Damon is thoroughly believable as the star struck young innocent who gradually descends into drug addiction, and Michael Douglas quite simply gives one of the best performances of his career.

    It would have been so easy, and so tempting, to overplay the role and come up with a clownish caricature, but Douglas completely avoids that trap, and comes up with a performance of great subtlety. If the movie had a cinema release in America, he would no doubt be in line for an Oscar. As it is, surely he’ll walk away with the Emmy.

    Available to buy / view on: Amazon | Amazon Prime | iTunes

  • FILM REVIEW | The Year Dolly Parton Was My Mum

    ★★★★★ | The Year Dolly Parton Was My Mum

    I rarely gush, especially when sober, but fasten your seat belts – I’m about to.

    I’ve just been fortunate enough to spend 1 and 1/2 hours in the company of some of the most wonderful talents around, including Dolly Parton.

    The Year Dolly Parton Was My Mum is one of those rare things, a film that manages to be both funny and serious, mixing the genres of road movie and coming of age – with Dolly Parton added into the mix (did I mention that already?)

    The story is simple:

    Eleven year old Elizabeth has a solid, simple life. That is until a run-of-the-mill school assignment alters her life, and the lives of the people around her forever. She’s struggling to cope with the usual pre-teen issues – boobs and periods, mean girls and then suddenly added to this, the fact she was adopted.

    She puts 2 and 2 together to get 3, and sets off to meet what she assumes to be her real mom, Dolly Parton, at a concert over the border in the US.

    What follows is a cross country chase (although with Elizabeth on her Chopper bike, this isn’t Fast or Furious!) when her adoptive mother overcomes her issues about her perfect life to re-ignite her relationship with her daughter – genetic or not.

    The film perfectly captures the feel and colour of 1976, the music of Dolly is used throughout and although she doesn’t actually appear in this indie flick, her presence is everywhere, including new versions of old classics by the likes of Nelly Fertado and Martha Wainwright.

    I won’t spoil this any more for you, but treat yourself. Pour a Cinzano and lemonade, don your best flares and fly away collar shirt and treat yourself to some pure escapism.

    Director Tara Johns makes a brilliant first feature, having penned the film also. The film succeeds because it feels personal, it feels real, and, most of all, it engages you and makes you feel good.

    I’d give the film 6 out of 5 if it were possible.

    Buy On Amazon | Buy or Watch On iTunes

  • FILM REVIEW | I’m So Excited

    I am a huge fan of Pedro Almodovar, and have loved every one of his films that I’ve seen. That is, until now.

    The title of his latest movie might be I’m So Excited but it left me singularly unexcited and unenthusiastic. I’ve never been so disengaged from an Almodovar film in my life and I’m still trying to work out what went wrong and why I found it so dreary. Was it the stilted dialogue, the wooden acting (even from Antonio Banderas and Penelope Cruz, who put in a couple of cameos), or the implausible storyline? Well, to be honest, most Almodovar movies have somewhat implausible and surreal plots, and that’s never bothered me before. In fact, that’s part of their charm.

    The film is billed as a comedy, but, apart from a few isolated one liners, I found it distinctly unfunny. Maybe the humour was dissipated by my having to read the subtitles (I don’t speak Spanish), but I’ve never found language to be a bar in previous Almodovar movies. The fact that the majority of this movie takes place within the confines of the business section and cockpit of a plane certainly doesn’t help, and, because of this, nowhere is there the kind of visual richness normally experienced in one of his movies. In addition, I found the camp antics and stereotypical behaviour of the all gay air stewards rather insulting. Haven’t we moved on from this kind of camperie? Honestly they could have been played by Liberace, Larry Grayson and John Inman and you wouldn’t have noticed the difference.

    I’m guessing the film is an allegory, the plane being a metaphor for the disastrous Spanish economy, the somnolent economy class passengers being representative of the majority of the populace, who are kept in the dark about what’s going on, whilst the ruling classes, in business class, run around like headless chickens, but I could be wrong and, quite honestly, I don’t really care. It is just one big self-indulgent bore, naïve and badly executed. Unless you’re particularly partial to watching undragged up drag queens mime to the Pointer Sisters, then I’d say avoid.

    Available to buy / view on: Amazon | Amazon Prime | iTunes