The Male Gaze: Risk Appeal (2023)

Shortbus

In post-9/11 New York City, an eclectic group of citizens find their lives entangled, personally, romantically, and sexually, at Shortbus, an underground Brooklyn salon infamous for its blend of art, music, politics, and carnality.

Irreversible

A woman’s lover and her ex-boyfriend take justice into their own hands after she becomes the victim of a rapist. Because some acts can’t be undone. Because man is an animal. Because the desire for vengeance is a natural impulse. Because most crimes remain unpunished.

Prisoner C33

Reading Gaol, England, 1896. Prisoner C33, starving and thin, unable to wash properly, is a brilliant writer, husband and father of two, once the most beloved artist in Victorian London. His real name is Oscar Wilde.

The Circle

A young teacher in Zurich in the 1950s falls in love with a transvestite star but is torn between his bourgeois existence and his commitment to homosexuality. He joins a gay organization that is eventually seen as the pioneer of gay emancipation in Europe.

Just Ask Him

Just Ask Him is a romantic LGBT short film about an out high school kid gathering the courage to ask his soccer jock crush to a dance.

Time to Leave

Romain, 31, a fashion photographer with terminal cancer, elects to die alone, preparing others to live past him rather than prolong the inevitable with chemotherapy or be smothered in sympathy by those who know him.

Naked Lunch

Blank-faced bug killer Bill Lee and his dead-eyed wife, Joan, like to get high on Bill's pest poisons while lounging with Beat poet pals. After meeting the devilish Dr. Benway, Bill gets a drug made from a centipede. Upon indulging, he accidentally kills Joan, takes orders from his typewriter-turned-cockroach, ends up in a constantly mutating Mediterranean city and learns that his hip friends have published his work -- which he doesn't remember writing.

Fujimi Orchestra: Cold Front Conductor

Tonoin Kei, a musical genius, becomes the new conductor of Fujimi, clashing with the group's leader, Morimura Yuuki, who is unaware of Kei's feelings for him.

Spokane

Two guys bail on a wedding, head to a strip club, and end up in a hotel room...

Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets

A portrait of the lives of a disparate group of patrons and employees at an American watering hole today.

The David Dance

Away from the microphone, David is soft spoken, shy and unsure of himself. However, as his on-air alias ‘Danger Dave,’ the host of “Gay Talk,” he’s poised, witty, and every listener’s best friend. His sister, Kate, a thrice divorced banker has a yen for Schumann and cats. Though successful, the siblings suffer from a secret, yet vast, sense of inadequacy. Kate decides to adopt and asks David to be a father figure. David gawkily romances his coworker. Past and present intertwine to tell the story of a man learning to love and accept himself.

The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert

Two drag queens and a transgender woman contract to perform a drag show at a resort in Alice Springs, a town in the remote Australian desert. As they head west from Sydney aboard their lavender bus, Priscilla, the three friends come to the forefront of a comedy of errors, encountering a number of strange characters, as well as incidents of homophobia, whilst widening comfort zones and exploring new horizons.

American Gigolo

Julian makes a lucrative living as an escort to older women in the Los Angeles area. He begins a relationship with Michelle, a local politician's wife, without expecting any pay. One of his clients is murdered and Detective Sunday begins pumping him for details on his different clients, something he is reluctant to do considering the nature of his work. Julian begins to suspect he's being framed. Meanwhile Michelle begins to fall in love with him.

And the Band Played On

The story of the discovery of the AIDS epidemic and the political infighting of the scientific community hampering the early fight with it.

Patrick

Patrick, 20-years-old, lives in Paris with his older boyfriend. He runs a teenage pornography website, which results in a prison sentence following a raid at a party. Mário, 8-years-old, was kidnapped 12 years ago in Portugal. Patrick and Mário are the same person with two conflicting identities: a life in Paris filled with parties, drugs, and promiscuity and a new rural life in Portugal, where he feels obliged to reconnect with a broken family.

The Whale

A reclusive English teacher suffering from severe obesity attempts to reconnect with his estranged teenage daughter for one last chance at redemption.

Blue Jean

Jean, a PE teacher, is forced to live a double life. When a new student arrives and threatens to expose her sexuality, Jean is pushed to extreme lengths to keep her job and her integrity.

Disco, Ibiza, Locomía

In the effervescent Spain of the 80s, Xavi Font, an artistic misfit, together with his friend Lurdes Iribar and her lover Manolo Arjona, founds Locomía. Although he achieves success, he also experiences the dark reality of the industry at the hands of powerful producer José Luís Gil.

Golden Years

The true story of a French WW1 deserter who, with the support of his wife, spends a decade in disguise as a woman.

Transamerica

A transgender woman takes an unexpected journey when she learns that she had a son, now a teenage runaway hustling on the streets of New York.

Desert Hearts

While waiting for her divorce papers, a repressed literature professor finds herself unexpectedly attracted by a carefree, spirited young woman named Cay.

Everything Is Illuminated

A young Jewish American man endeavors—with the help of eccentric, distant relatives—to find the woman who saved his grandfather during World War II—in a Ukrainian village which was ultimately razed by the Nazis.

Summer Storm

Tobi and Achim, the pride of the local crew club, have been the best of friends for years and are convinced that nothing will ever stand in the way of their friendship. They look forward to the upcoming summer camp and the crew competition. Then the gay team from Berlin arrives and Tobi is totally confused. The evening before the races begin, the storm that breaks out is more than meteor-logical.

Mala Noche

Walt is a lonely convenience store clerk who has fallen in love with a Mexican migrant worker named Johnny. Though Walt has little in common with the object of his affections — including a shared language — his desire to possess Johnny prompts a sexual awakening that results in a tangled love triangle.

Requiem for a Dream

The drug-induced utopias of four Coney Island residents are shattered when their addictions run deep.

God's Own Country

A young farmer in rural Yorkshire numbs his daily frustrations with binge drinking and casual sex, until the arrival of a Romanian migrant worker.

Bend It Like Beckham

Jess Bhamra, the daughter of a strict Indian couple in London, is not permitted to play organized soccer, even though she is 18. When Jess is playing for fun one day, her impressive skills are seen by Jules Paxton, who then convinces Jess to play for her semi-pro team. Jess uses elaborate excuses to hide her matches from her family while also dealing with her romantic feelings for her coach, Joe.

Supernatural

Science fiction about a future Thailand. Futuristic, experimental, homo-erotic and with elements of a political essay. With a richness of themes and impressions that wouldn’t get past the censor in Thailand. The maker doesn’t mince his words and isn’t afraid to look reality in the eye.

My Own Private Idaho

In this loose adaptation of Shakespeare's "Henry IV," Mike Waters is a hustler afflicted with narcolepsy. Scott Favor is the rebellious son of a mayor. Together, the two travel from Portland, Oregon to Idaho and finally to the coast of Italy in a quest to find Mike's estranged mother. Along the way they turn tricks for money and drugs, eventually attracting the attention of a wealthy benefactor and sexual deviant.

7 Virgins

Tano is 16-years-old and is already sitting in jail. In 48 hours he’s a free man and off to the wedding of his brother. In the two days he recounts his neighborhood in a section of Sevilla.

Fire

In a barren, arranged marriage to an amateur swami who seeks enlightenment through celibacy, Radha's life takes an irresistible turn when her beautiful young sister-in-law seeks to free herself from the confines of her own loveless marriage.

Shabbat Dinner

Shabbat Dinner is boring as usual for William Shore. His mother has invited two crazy hippies and their son and is doing her best to show off, his father is drunk and berating their oddball guests, and he doesn't have much in common with their son Virgo. That is, until Virgo tells him that he has just come out as gay.

Tam Tam

At a very camp party in Paris, guests are told about a strange tom-tom played by an Andalusian gipsy, himself a character in a book by a young novelist present at the party. A frantic quest begins for a mysterious love-filter. Tam Tam shows desire and repression through the subversion of archetypes both social (ambassadors, stars, artists) and sexual (homophiles, transvestites, transsexuals), and converting these into a most accurate account of a certain kind of unease: an identity crisis.

Whole New Thing

Socially isolated by his parents, an androgynous teen enrolls in high school and develops a crush on his male teacher.

Sad Temptation

A closeted middle aged man named Suh Moon Gi is unsatisfied with his wife Suh Jung Hye. He meets a young homosexual employee Shin Joon Young at his company and falls in love.

Xenia

Strangers in their own birthplace, 16-year-old Danny and 18-year-old Odysseus cross the entire country in search of their Greek father, after their Albanian mother passes away.

We

A summer trip to Berlin offers a fleeting glimpse into the lives of the country's youth in this vibrant, character-driven drama from director Martin Gypkens. When twentysomething Florian arrives in town to pay a visit to long-lost pal Pit, the duo quickly reminisce before heading out to a party. Soon meeting up with many of Pit's acquaintances, the film follows various intersecting lives as they are woven to create an intricate, microcosmic look at life's ups and downs as seen through the eyes of Germany's youth.

All Over Me

Claude and Ellen are best friends who live in a not-so-nice area of New York. They're involved in the subculture of 90s youth, complete with drugs, live music, and homophobia. All is changed one night when a violent and meaningless death rocks their lives.

Amnesia: The James Brighton Enigma

A young man wakes up naked on a pallet on the street in Montreal. Who is he, what is his name? How did he get here? The only thing he seems to remember is that he's gay. And so begins one of the most compelling gay-themed mysteries we’ve seen. Based on a true story, this young man has been through some trauma that caused his memory loss -- or is he an imposter avoiding the law in some way?

Street Kid

Axel is 14 years old, male prostitute, living in Düsseldorf. His mother drinks and her friends abuses him. He is sent to a bar to pick up customers. There he meets Karl-Heinz, and a loving relationship begins.

Nina's Heavenly Delights

A feisty young woman returns to Glasgow to run her deceased father's curry house.

Wild Side

A transgender woman returns – with her two male lovers – to her family home in the countryside to look after her dying mother.

Sacred Silence

A young priest crusades against organized crime in his Naples neighbourhood but falls in love with a 13-year-old boy. It's the chance the gangsters were waiting for to get rid of the thorn in their side. Will they be able to force the boy to accuse the priest of sexual harassment and have his reputation destroyed?

Beau Travail

Foreign Legion officer Galoup recalls his once glorious life, training troops in the Gulf of Djibouti. His existence there was happy, strict and regimented, until the arrival of a promising young recruit, Sentain, plants the seeds of jealousy in Galoup's mind.

Firebird

At the height of the Cold War, a troubled soldier forms a forbidden love triangle with a daring fighter pilot and his female comrade amid the dangerous surroundings of a Soviet Air Force Base.

Beautiful Mystery

Shinohara, a young bodybuilder, joins a para-military sect in northern Japan. His instructor, Takizawa, takes a liking to the new recruit. After an early “special” training session the two develop a lasting and loving relationship.

Against the Law

United Kingdom, March 24, 1954. Ten years before the decriminalization of homosexuality, journalist Peter Wildeblood and his friends Lord Montagu and Michael Pitt-Rivers are convicted and imprisoned for indecency and sodomy.

The Long Good Friday

In the late 1970s, Cockney crime boss Harold Shand, a gangster trying to become a legitimate property mogul, has big plans to get the American Mafia to bankroll his transformation of a derelict area of London into the possible venue for a future Olympic Games. However, a series of bombings targets his empire on the very weekend the Americans are in town. Shand is convinced there is a traitor in his organization, and sets out to eliminate the rat in typically ruthless fashion.

Shake It All About

Jacob is a young man used to getting everything he wants. For several years, he has been living in a happy homosexual partnership with Jørgen, and one night Jacob decides to pop the big question to Jørgen. Jørgen happily accepts Jacobs marriage proposal, but then something happens: Jacob falls in love with a girl, and not just any girl. The girl is Caroline, married to Jørgens younger brother Tom.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch

Raised a boy in East Berlin, Hedwig undergoes a personal transformation in order to emigrate to the U.S., where she reinvents herself as an 'internationally ignored' but divinely talented rock diva, inhabiting a 'beautiful gender of one'.

Withnail & I

Two out-of-work actors -- the anxious, luckless Marwood and his acerbic, alcoholic friend, Withnail -- spend their days drifting between their squalid flat, the unemployment office and the pub. When they take a holiday "by mistake" at the country house of Withnail's flamboyantly gay uncle, Monty, they encounter the unpleasant side of the English countryside: tedium, terrifying locals and torrential rain.

Baby Steps

A year after the death of their beloved Lily, Beau and Caden learn that she froze some of her eggs and they must decide whether they are ready to take the next step in their relationship and become parents.

Because You're Mine

Torn by the farewell letter of his boyfriend, Samuel tries to change his ideas in nature. The forest will bring him a strange and sensual consolation…

Born in 68

1968. Catherine, Yves and Hervé are twenty years old. They're students in Paris and they love each other. The May student uprisings radically change their lives. Overtaken by communal utopia, they leave the city with a few friends to set up house in an abandoned farm in the Lot region. A desire for freedom and the search for individual fulfillment lead them to make choices that cause them to separate.

Patrik, Age 1.5

Göran and Sven have been cleared for adoption and they have a possibility to adopt a swedish orphan, Patrik 1,5. But when Patrik arrives he turns out to be someone else, not the little boy they were expecting. A comma had been misplaced, and in comes a 15-year-old homophobic with a criminal past.

Rent: Filmed Live on Broadway

Set in New York City's gritty East Village, the revolutionary rock opera RENT tells the story of a group of bohemians struggling to live and pay their rent. "Measuring their lives in love," these starving artists strive for success and acceptance while enduring the obstacles of poverty, illness and the AIDS epidemic.

Bathory: Countess of Blood

Bathory is based on the legends surrounding the life and deeds of Countess Elizabeth Bathory known as the greatest murderess in the history of mankind. Contrary to popular belief, Elizabeth Bathory was a modern Renaissance woman who ultimately fell victim to men’s aspirations for power and wealth.

Pulse

A gay disabled teenage boy changes into the body of a beautiful woman, so that he can be loved.

I Love Hooligans

A football hooligan feels unconditional love for his club. However, being gay, he has to hide his identity in order to survive in this world that is so precious to him.

Hello, Stranger

Arthur is a single dad, struggling with the care for his seven-year-old son Max and the combination of his secret life as a drag queen.

Naked

A message from Javier's boyfriend changes his family situation and causes them to reconsider their relationships.

Just Charlie

Football star Charlie has the world at her feet. With a top club desperate to sign her, her future is seemingly mapped out. But the teenager sees only a nightmare. Raised as a boy, Charlie is torn between wanting to live up to her father's expectations and shedding this ill fitting skin.

Ride or Die

Rei helps the woman she's been in love with for years escape her abusive husband. While on the run, their feelings for each other catch fire.

Our Son

When his husband Gabriel files for divorce, Nicky fights for custody of their 8-year-old son Owen, as he struggles to come to terms with what it means to love someone and what it means to be a father.

Macho Caponata

Takeshi runs a popular Italian restaurant in a port town. His ex-lover Kazuyoshi went to Italy to train as a chef seven years ago so he is single. His sister is pregnant with the baby of Kazuyoshi’s younger brother and a wedding between the pair will happen before the birth. Due to this, Kazuyoshi returns from Italy and invites Takeshi to go to Italy with him.

An Eye for an Eye and a Hole for a Hole

Kenji, the young head of Kato yakuza organisation, just got out of the jail. He comes home and founds out the opposing Sawaki yakuza is invading Kato's territory. Sawaki recruited Ikeyama and asked him to kill Kenji, but Ikeyama was Kenji's lover who exchanged the cup of brothers in a jail.

Exteriors

Three gay men each find themselves in modern relationship issues through three separate coincidences. Wyatt learns that his best friend Logan is unknowingly falling in love with his ex, while Jason is shocked to learn the owner of the pool he's cleaning is the man he fell in love with over a one-night stand eight years earlier. Finally, therapist Peter Lesh has become dangerously obsessed with his client Lex who tells him he's just met the man of his dreams.

One to Another

A story about bunch of people who live in a town in provincial France. At the center of it all is Pierre, a conceited and vain bisexual musician in his late teens who acts as a magnet, to varying degrees, for a whole array of characters - from his sister Lucie, with whom he has a heated incestuous relationship, to a city councilor with whom he participates in gay orgies. When Pierre turns up dead, Lucie investigates the reasons for his demise and charts the network of sadomasochistic relationships that crisscross the town.

The Curiosity of Chance

It’s the ‘80s once again, new wave angst and genderbending fashion are all the rage, but new kid at school, Chance Marquis, is trying to find new ways to stand out. Being an odd and somewhat awkward teenager makes him the target of the school bully. To deal with this dilemma, Chance turns to the opposite ends of the high school spectrum for help. On one side is the flamboyant drag queen and at the other, the varsity jock, Levi Sparks with whom Chance develops a unique friendship.

Dying to Sleep

Terrifying nightmares, a broken family, and a mysterious Holistic Doctor, haunt Mary as she searches for the strength to find forgiveness amongst dark betrayals.

Ella

Ella, a young aspiring actress, stands at a crossroads, pondering her journey on the day of a career-defining audition. her career. No matter how small, every decision can change the course of her day, illuminating the subtle battles of everyday life. In the heart-vibrant chaos of Paris, Ella navigates the complexities of her identity: a foreigner, a woman, and a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community.

Holding Trevor

After finally breaking up with his drug-addicted lover, Trevor begins a new romance that unexpectedly complicates his other relationships.

Ma Rainey's Black Bottom

Tensions rise when the trailblazing Mother of the Blues and her band gather at a Chicago recording studio in 1927. Adapted from August Wilson's play.

Head On

Nineteen-year-old Ari confronts both his sexuality and his Greek family. Ari despises his once-beloved parents, former radical activists, for having entombed themselves in insular tradition. Ari is obsessed with gay sex, although he does make an unenthusiastic attempt to satisfy the sister of one of his best friends. While all of this is going on, he's facing problems with his traditional Greek parents, who have no clue about his sexual activities.

The Man Who Loved Yngve

It’s November 1989 and the world is changing. So is Jarle, who attends Kongsgård High School in Stavanger. He plays the guitar/lead singer in a local punk band, has a great girlfriend, and has the coolest best friend. But it's all about to change when Yngve enters the classroom.