The Male Gaze: Celluloid Dreams (2021)

Closets

It's 1986, tormented teenager Henry is struggling with his sexuality and abusive home life. Henry sits in his closet contemplating suicide. In a flash of light he is transported to 2016 where he meets teenager Ben — now occupying his room 30 years later.

The Happy Prince

In 1895, Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) was the most famous writer in London, and Bosie Douglas, son of the notorious Marquess of Queensberry, was his lover. Accused and convicted of gross indecency, he was imprisoned for two years and subjected to hard labor. Once free, he abandons England to live in France, where he will spend his last years, haunted by memories of the past, poverty and immense sadness.

Burning Blue

Two Navy fighter pilots find themselves in the midst of a forbidden relationship throwing their lives and careers into disarray.

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.

Spaceless

Kan and Tul are aspiring actors who meet at an audition. From there on, another story unfolds, and both find themselves battling their own feelings.

Ghosts

Nina, an end-of-teenage orphan with mental problems, starts a new job as a garden cleaner when she meets Toni. They fell in love with each other, but soon Toni starts betraying Nina. In the meantime, Francoise is picked up at a psychic department of a Berlin hospital by her husband, Pierre. After seeing Nina, Francoise believes that she has found her kidnapped daughter Marie, but neither Toni nor Pierre believe her. Nina is unsure about what to think...

The Talented Mr. Ripley

Tom Ripley is a calculating young man who believes it's better to be a fake somebody than a real nobody. Opportunity knocks in the form of a wealthy U.S. shipbuilder who hires Tom to travel to Italy to bring back his playboy son, Dickie. Ripley worms his way into the idyllic lives of Dickie and his girlfriend, plunging into a daring scheme of duplicity, lies and murder.

Frida

A biography of artist Frida Kahlo, who channeled the pain of a crippling injury and her tempestuous marriage into her work.

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.

Filip

Seven-year-old Filip admires his older brother Sebastian most of all. They fool around, watch movies and play football together. One evening Filip happens to see something unexpected between Sebastian and his best friend and Filip doesn't know how to handle it.

It Was Yesterday

Giò, a 13-year-old girl living in the south of Italy, is the head of a boys' gang. She's secretly in love with young Paola, and she's ready to compete with male opponents to win her heart. In the last day of summer, innocence ends.

Of an Age

A Serbian ballroom dancer experiences an unexpected and intense 24-hour romance with a friend's older brother.

Alexander

Alexander, the King of Macedonia, leads his legions against the giant Persian Empire. After defeating the Persians, he leads his army across the then known world, venturing farther than any westerner had ever gone, all the way to India.

My Condolences to Your Future Lovers

Idealist Vicky is desperate to find a way to convince her whirlwind summer love, Stacey, that theirs wasn’t just a holiday romance. She fights passionately for young love and picture-perfect moments, convinced Stacey is just scared or in the closet.

Some of My Best Friends Are...

Regulars gather at The Blue Jay, a gay bar in Manhattan's Greenwich Village, to celebrate Christmas Eve 1971 with people they consider family.

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.

My Little Boy

Berlin, 1934. Many men are forced to live their hidden homosexuality. Erich, a photographer, has an appointment in his photo studio with Wolfgang, a Nazi soldier, with whom he shares a loving, tumultuous, and passionate relationship. For both of them, this should not be a problem, but appearances deceive.

Stout-Hearted

Felix is secretly in love with Ralph. This doesn't seem to be the biggest problem. But Felix is 15 and Ralph his 34 years old soccer coach. They meet every day in an ambush. One day Felix mother finds out and Ralph has to decide between feeling and reason.

Drawn Out Love

Felix has been raised by his grandmother and has never met his father. His father Johan, doesn't even know he exists. Felix decides to become a regular in his father's bar in Amsterdam to secretly learn more about the man he has never known.

Haus

A displaced black queer boy finds refuge in his city's underground Kiki Ballroom scene.

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.

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.

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.

Undress Me

Mikaela has undergone gender reassignment and is now a woman. One night at a bar, she meets a guy and takes him back to her place.

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 taboo trysts and a tangled love triangle.

Silent Sparks

Loyal to his gangster boss, Pua risks everything for money—and for Mi-ji, the ex-prisoner he secretly loves. But freedom brings distance, not desire.

L'immensità

Set in 1970s Rome, the fiction tracks the plight of a nuclear family, consisting of an unhappy married couple: Clara (a deeply dissatisfied expatriate Spaniard) and Felice (an abusive businessman cheating on Clara with his secretary) and their children Adriana, Gino, and Diana. Their eldest child, 12-year-old Adriana, experiences gender dysphoria; he rejects girlhood and instead goes by the name of Andrea (a primarily masculine name in Italian). Andrea develops a crush for Sara, a Roma girl who knows him as a boy. Upon a shared sense of being outsiders, Andrea and Clara grow closer.

A Haunting of Past Ink

A person receives old entries from their diary, unsure of who is sending them. They eventually arrive at a moment of transcendence.

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.

Cavafy

An ailing, elderly poet reminisces about his life of unrest and homosexual urges.

Burger

It's late night in a burger bar in Wales...

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.

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 Christmas Lottery

The Davenport sisters have drifted apart over the years but when their Dad wins the lottery all he wants is having his girls home for Christmas. Getting over years of resentment proves a big task but it's pushed aside when their mother suffering from dementia loses the ticket. They put aside their differences to help find the ticket and in doing so get over their differences and finally learn to come together.

Maybe... Maybe Not

The heterosexual man Axel is thrown out of his girlfriends home for cheating and ends up moving in with a gay man. Axel learns the advantages of living with gay men even though they are attracted to him and when his girlfriend wants him back he must make a tough decision.

Pray Away

A seminary student confronts his religious views when he falls in love with another man.

Vera

Based on the life of Brazilian poet Anderson Bigode Herzer, this intense drama tells the story of Bauer, a trans man who navigates a difficult life in an orphanage before finding love with young librarian Clara.

The Devil's Magnificent

Manu, a trans immigrant, must return to her native Chile after 10 years in France. In the days leading up to her departure, Manu’s platonic friend Daniel proposes marriage with the intention of solving her visa issues. Manu strongly considers the offer, but she’s wholly disheartened at the prospect of a life without love, romance, and sex—that is, until she meets a fellow foreigner who instills in her the hope for a romantic future.

Something Must Break

A gritty story taking place in Stockholm, about the passionate love between the self-abusive Sebastian who wants to be a woman, and the easy-going Andreas who is certainly not gay.

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.

Requiem for a Dream

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

Until This Day

As Anna and her girlfriend Mia spend their last hours together before Anna sets off to leave Milwaukee to join the Peace Corps, Mia is troubled by her departure.

Caught in a Landslide

Through a combination of pharmaceuticals and alcohol, Jay walks through the lost memories of true love. Tonight, he will walk in the wilting greenhouse that was the backdrop to his summer romance and he'll meet his familiar resident ghost.

The Distance Between Us and the Sky

Night, national road. Two strangers meet for the first time at an old gas station. One has stopped to gas up his bike, while the other is just stranded. Lacking the 22 euros he needs to get home, he will try to sell him the distance that separates them from the sky.

Hara Kiri

A punk infused love story of two street skaters, August and Beto, and their last day on earth: they're gonna end it.

Miles from Nowhere

During an annual cabin retreat, a dying man must confront past mistakes after learning he may not know his friends as well as he may think.

RosaTigre

This is a story about a Neapolitan guy, Antonello, immigrant in Turin, who, for a living, hooks on the street as Rosatigre. Sasà, a friend of his, tries to bring him back to Naples, but, after a tortured decision, Antonello chooses to come back North and to keep living “on the street”.

Legend of Long Yang

Long Yang is a strategist, martial artist, diplomat, and the first ever male paramour of all Chinese history. Living in the warring states period of ancient China–– a time of turbulence and uncertainty––he manages to gain the favor of Ji Yu, the King of Wei. A series of magical events bring the lord and his servant together as lovers, but dangerous conspiracies within the harem are lurking to destroy their romance……

Jeremiah

An Asian-American high school football player is forced to confront his deepest fears after a strange encounter with a mysterious figure.

Floating Melon

A journey of passion, a bitter night. Xiao Cheng ask for help to resolve a big trouble, the guy with whom he spend the afternoon is dead on his bed from the effect of a drug, not something the Chinese authorities look kindly on.

In Seventh Heaven

Sofiane lives in a high-rise block at the edges of Paris. A violent young man, he tries to be like his gang of friends. However, Sofiane is attracted to guys. Through his contradictions, he embodies the confusion of today's idle young people who have lost their bearings and live withdrawn into themselves.