Gilles (2016)

The Male Gaze: Nocturnal Instincts

Strap yourself in for an exhilarating journey into darkness with these five award-winning short films from across the globe that delve into heart-pumping escapades varying from the intensely erotic to the ultra-violent to the warm-inside feels. The night has never looked so inviting. Segments: After Dawn [Passée l'aube] (2017), Poof (2018), Spiral (2018), Night of Love (2018), Floating Melon [浮果] (2015).

The Best Bride

A man loses his wife. A woman finds her husband. A mother sees her children.

A Menina que Nunca Viu o Mar

Iara, a girl who is about to come of age, dreams of seeing the ocean, but lives in Rio Grande do Norte's countryside with her mother, a woman who's dreams were swallowed by the waves and who fears of losing her daughter.

Honeymoon

Sandra is travelling with Fay, helping her take the bus out of the country. A transphobic attack leaves them both stranded in the middle of nowhere. A sensitive and vibrant response to intolerance in the form of a gritty and realistic road movie.

Freak Show

The story of teenager Billy Bloom who, despite attending an ultra conservative high school, makes the decision to run for homecoming queen.

Bye Bye Victor

Friendship between two old men becomes love. Slightly-unkempt, tired, and frail, Philippe Lanctot moves into a rest home. The administrator says she wants him to be happy, but that seems far from his mind: he's waiting to die. Then, into his room, unannounced, rolls the voluble Victor Laprade, who draws out Philippe over the next few months. Victor gives Philippe the gift of experiencing the moment. In return, the well-heeled Philippe organises field trips to dinner and to a botanical garden, and, unknown to Victor, becomes the man's benefactor when Victor's children get stingy. The openly-gay Victor also pushes Philippe to acknowledge feelings he's always kept suppressed.

Cherry Blossoms in March

In this mother-daughter story, a young woman explores her own mortality through art and poetry as her terminal illness holds her back from a normal life.

Walk on Water

Eyal, an Israeli Mossad agent, is given the mission to track down and kill the very old Alfred Himmelman, an ex-Nazi officer, who might still be alive. Pretending to be a tourist guide, he befriends his grandson Axel, in Israel to visit his sister Pia. The two men set out on a tour of the country, during which Axel challenges Eyal's values.

Paradise Now

Two childhood friends are recruited for a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv.

Billy Elliot

County Durham, England, 1984. The miners' strike has started and the police have started coming up from Bethnal Green, starting a class war with the lower classes suffering. Caught in the middle of the conflict is 11-year old Billy Elliot, who, after leaving his boxing club for the day, stumbles upon a ballet class and finds out that he's naturally talented. He practices with his teacher Mrs. Wilkinson for an upcoming audition in Newcastle-upon Tyne for the royal Ballet school in London.

American History X

Derek Vineyard is paroled after serving 3 years in prison for killing two African-American men. Through his brother, Danny Vineyard's narration, we learn that before going to prison, Derek was a skinhead and the leader of a violent white supremacist gang that committed acts of racial crime throughout L.A. and his actions greatly influenced Danny. Reformed and fresh out of prison, Derek severs contact with the gang and becomes determined to keep Danny from going down the same violent path as he did.

All About My Mother

Following the tragic death of her teenage son, Manuela travels from Madrid to Barcelona in an attempt to contact the long-estranged father the boy never knew. She reunites with an old friend, an outspoken transgender sex worker, and befriends a troubled actress and a pregnant, HIV-positive nun.

Bad Education

An examination on the effect of Franco-era religious schooling and sexual abuse on the lives of two longtime friends.

Brokeback Mountain

In 1960s Wyoming, two men develop a strong emotional and sexual relationship that endures as a lifelong connection complicating their lives as they get married and start families of their own.

The Obituary of Tunde Johnson

A wealthy, Nigerian-American teenager is pulled over by police, shot to death, and immediately awakens, trapped in a terrifying time loop that forces him to confront difficult truths about his life and himself.

Two of Us

Nina and Madeleine have been sharing their lives and the landing between their two apartments for decades. After more than 20 years of loving in the shadows, Madeleine promises Nina she will tell her family the truth. It takes an unexpected event to show her the importance of living your truth.

Nimic

A professional cellist has an encounter with a stranger on the subway which has unexpected and far-reaching ramifications on his life.

Gym Classes

Siblings Clara and Pietro aren't close, but they share a hatred for the high school that she's recently started attending and that he graduated from years before. Forced to wait in the school with their father, familial tensions arise.

Gothix

An innovative and charismatic influencer is suddenly exiled from her community of creative partners and colleagues when she states an opinion that she did not know was “unacceptable” in their eyes.

Young Soul Rebels

Two disc jockeys have a friend's murder to solve in the fringe-group melting pot of 1977 London.

Made in Britain

After being sent to a detention centre, a teenage skinhead clashes with the social workers who want to conform him to the status quo.

Looking for Langston

A black and white, fantasy-like recreation of high-society gay men during the Harlem Renaissance, with archival footage and photographs intercut with a story. A wake is going on, with mourners gathered around a coffin. Downstairs is an elegant bar where tuxedoed men dance and talk. One of them has a dream in which he comes upon Beauty, who seems to reject him, although when he awakes, Beauty is sleeping beside him. His story and his visits to the jazz and dance club are framed by voices reading from the poetry and essays of Hughes and others. The text is rarely explicit, but the freedom of gay Black men in the 1920s in Harlem is suggested and celebrated visually.

Whistle

Whistle depicts the dreary off-hours of an ultra-technological hit-man who becomes 'involved' in the life of one of his victims. The hit-man's wife is not only fully cognizant of her husband's day job but she is also the cold-blooded contact with his bosses when the conscience crisis sets in!

Dorian Blues

Dorian realizes he is gay in his final year of high school. He meets another gay youth locally, but remains confused. He starts therapy, then resorts to confession in the Church, and finally comes out to his brother. Dorian then decides to come out to his father; he gets kicked out of the house.

Green Plaid Shirt

This endearing drama depicts the lives of five gay friends — in conflict with themselves and each other — at the dawn of the AIDS era. Back in 1978 everything seemed possible. For Phillip and Guy, there was the thrill and exhilaration of first love. For their friends Devon, Jerry and Todd, life was still an open book with so many pages yet to be filled. Ten years later, his friends are all gone and Phillip is left alone to make sense of the joys and sorrows of his past life — as he looks hopefully to the future. The lives of two ordinary men who find love together only to lose it. In an era of easy sex and open relationships they have only two rules: Don't fall in love with others and no jealousy. Still rules are made to be broken. Eventually a single act of forgiveness restores their love.

Parting Glances

Michael and Robert, two gay men living in Brooklyn, spend their last day together before Robert leaves for Africa on work assignment. Michael still has feelings for his friend Nick, who has AIDS.

Soldier's Girl

This true story, which takes place in Fort Campbell, KY, tells the heart-wrenching story of the life and tragic death of soldier Barry Winchell. His love for Calpernia Addams, a transgender nightclub performer, was misunderstood by his fellow soldiers and eventually led to his murder.

Sister Wives

Two young women living in a strict, fundamentalist, polygamous society, Kaidence and Galilee, find themselves bound to one another, under the same roof, in the same marriage, as they develop scary, new, exciting feelings for each other. In a harsh, regressive, watchful community where being queer is considered a cardinal sin, they begin having thoughts of leaving the only life they have ever known behind.

The Teacher

When the 26-year-old Civics teacher, Kevin, openly voices his stance on marriage equality at school, he stirs up a storm. His being madly in love with an HIV positive man doesn't sit well with all the people around him. When a rumour breaks out about his HIV status, he is forced to make choices no one should have to.

Unicorn

A young German/Bolivian Mennonite risks his life to escape his strict religious community to find love and freedom in the city.

My First Suit

14-year old Steve is caught between creatures he does not fully understand: two parents with very different ideas about the suit he should wear to his first school dance. Meanwhile everywhere he seems to look, images of men are taking control of his imagination. In Stewart Main's comical coming of age story Steve escapes his parents' good wishes, to discover his true desires. They aren't quite what his no-nonsense father had in mind.

Romeo & Romeo

Zak faces the past head on, finding out burried secrets which test his sobriety. A heartfelt gay film full of love and heartbreak.

Frontera

During the last moments of a romantic involvement with an older man, Martina finds herself deeply overwhelmed by disappointment and confusion, left alone to question who she really is.

Poz

A troubled "twunk" ventures down a destructive path, searching for a solution to his problems and a way to ensure his sister's continued support.

Who Are You?

Nowadays, many people use dating apps just for hook-ups. If you want to have sex, you can have it almost instantly. However, the price for this is our lost identity. This has many advantages but also many disadvantages, which some people may misuse. What happens if a thief and a policeman decide to use such a dating app?

Get Real

Sensitive rural town model student Steven Carter hides his gay feelings, except with his neighbor and best friend Linda. Suddenly his desperate search for partners leads to a blind date with golden boy John Dixon, bound for an Oxbridge career.

Mary and Max

A tale of friendship between two unlikely pen pals: Mary, a lonely, eight-year-old girl living in the suburbs of Melbourne, and Max, a forty-four-year old, severely obese man living in New York.

Matewan

Filmed in the coal country of West Virginia, "Matewan" celebrates labor organizing in the context of a 1920s work stoppage. Union organizer, Joe Kenehan, a scab named "Few Clothes" Johnson and a sympathetic mayor and police chief heroically fight the power represented by a coal company and Matewan's vested interests so that justice and workers' rights need not take a back seat to squalid working conditions, exploitation and the bottom line.

Borstal Boy

Brendan Behan, a sixteen year-old IRA foot soldier, is going on a bombing mission from Ireland to Liverpool during the second world war. His mission is thwarted when he is apprehended, charged and imprisoned in Borstal, a reform institution for young offenders in East Anglia, England.

No Goodbyes

Love in a concentration camp. A young Jewish gay man, Otto, is protected by a "kapo" (a fellow prisoner) and an SS guard who unexpectedly ends up saving his life.

Samira

Janosch, an interpreter, is called to help during a police deployment at the Port of Hamburg. A young African woman has barricaded herself in a container ship and threatens to commit suicide. In order to get her out, Janosch promises to help her, an offer which bears unexpected consequences.

Louder Than Words

A young musician named Ansel has an unexpected encounter with Niall, an endearing, deaf dancer.

Just Me

Scott gets a visit from Connor which brings his past back to haunt him, but will it change his future?

Beyond Plain Sight

Ryan is a popular member of his community. He’s charming, helping and a social butterfly but Ryan has a secret.

Like Father

A Jewish New Yorker is bedridden patriarch dying of lung cancer, confesses for the first time to son that he was always attracted to men. Despite his long-lasting marriage and faithfulness to wife.

Neon Skin

Two young men - one sighted, one blind - see the world and their bodies in different ways. Unexpectedly, they find a connection beyond the visual in the collision of taste, touch and sound. The connection is sensual, and within it they each find something new.

Leylak

In present-day Queens, a Turkish gravedigger is unable to face a shattering truth and risks losing the dearest connection left in his life.

Alfa

Alfa, a famous porn actor, must deal with his fears, insecurities and memories when he begins work on a new film without Yerry, his former partner in life and porn. On his first day of shooting without him, Alfa tries to act as in the past but can things be like before? Javier Ferreiro's short film reflects on the difficult decision of letting someone go to move forward. ALFA is framed in the context of gay porn cinema in Cuba where pornography is banned but, little by little, it's growing up an underground industry impulsed by foreign tourism.

Show Me Love

Two teenage girls in small-town Sweden. Elin is beautiful, popular, and bored with life. Agnes is friendless, sad, and secretly in love with Elin.

Three

Tom, a young architect from Tel Aviv, accepts his partner Nimrod's offer of a threesome with Or. The meeting with Or changes the couple's relationship.

Welcome Home, Bobby

When a Chicago teen is arrested for drug possession, the ensuing investigation reveals that he has had sexual contact with an older man. Discovering his sexual encounter, other students start shunning him and call for his expulsion from school. His conservative blue-collar dad also rejects him, while his mother does try to offer support.

LIMBS

Emotionally volatile and ostracized from his home, 21-year-old JD Weymouth has picked up long distance running as a way to center himself. When an old friend returns to town, JD must confront his past and the emotional distance he’s yet to cover.

Air

There is something that has tormented Cristina since she was the age of her little daughter Regina and that could endanger the happiness of both of them. Because the scars of a traumatic past can be passed on to children and that is what Cristina wants to avoid at all costs but does not know how.

Pitbull

Manuel is 23 years old, he is independent and his only company is his pitbull dog. One morning he meets Margarita, a woman twice his age and with whom he sleeps in a nearby motel, receiving the first anilingus of his life. Confused between pleasure and fear, Manuel reflects on his prejudices, his masculinity and his identity.