Male Shorts: International V4 (2022)

Saving Face

A Chinese-American lesbian and her traditionalist mother are reluctant to go public with secret loves that clash against cultural expectations.

Pretty Boy

Sean is taken to a motel and is given a prostitute for his 18th birthday by his father. He must sleep with her to "fix" his questionable homosexuality. "Pretty Boy" is a coming of age story of a young bullied teen, Sean, struggling with his sexuality and the hardships of high school. After his father finds some questionable magazines in his room, this devout Christian will go to any lengths to get his son to find the light and "perform" the way a man should. Sean is introduced to Katie, a prostitute that understands the stigmas of modern society and helps him see the true light that is within him.

Rift

Months after they broke up, Gunnar receives a strange phone call from his ex-boyfriend, Einar. He sounds distraught, like he's about to do something terrible to himself. Gunnar drives up to the secluded cabin where Einar is holed up and soon discovers that there's more going on than he imagined. As the two men come to terms with their broken relationship, some other person seems to be lurking outside the cabin, wanting to get in.

In This Moment

“In This Moment” follows Love, a trans woman navigating the complexities of polyamory and self-discovery in a world that often challenges her right to exist. As she unravels what it means to be truly seen and cherished, she confronts the ways love manifests—fluid, unpredictable, and boundless, much like the ocean itself. This story is a testament to resilience, intimacy, and the ever-shifting tides of identity and belonging.

Aloof

Yariv is a shy photographer charged to take photos at a family birthday. The photographs he takes highlight his problematic relationship with his brother, and increasingly intertwine to his extreme sexual experiences at the gay sauna.

Close to You

A trans man returns to his hometown for the first time in years. On his journey, he confronts his relationship with his family, reunites with a first love, and discovers a newfound confidence in himself.

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.

Pria

Caught between the traditions of his upbringing in rural Indonesia and his idealization of Western freedom, a teenager struggles with the expectations of imminent manhood.

Pedro

Pedro gets home at dawn. Before the young boy falls asleep, his lonely mother drags him to the beach.

The Colour Blue

Reece tries to find the courage to come out to his family and friends.

I Killed My Mother

Hubert, a brash 17-year-old, is confused and torn by a love-hate relationship with his mother that consumes him more and more each day. After distressing ordeals and tragic episodes, Hubert will find his mother on the banks of Saint Lawrence river, where he grew up, and where a murder will be committed: the murder of childhood.

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…

Adult

Having enabled a loss that now torments her, a woman enters an adult store in search of redemption. Adapted from a short story by Christos Tsiolkas.

A Particular Friend

When Father Matthew discovers an intimacy between two of the other priests at a remote conversion-therapy centre in Northern Ireland, his attempt to do the right thing leads to a crisis of faith and feeling.

Bromance

When three friends go on a camping trip in a remote part of Argentina, sexual tensions quickly bubble to the surface. Once in virtual seclusion by the beach, Juli, also camping at the site, quickly recognises that that the boys seem to have a closer relationship than what she would consider 'normal'. The line between friendship and love fade further for two of the boys in particular as their desire becomes too much to bear. When what started as a simple getaway quickly becomes tinged with sex, romance, and conflict, everyone is forced to confront who they really are for the very first time.

First Taste

Yuna, a woman engaged with her long time boyfriend, Nicco, starts to have second thoughts when she meets again her first love, Becca. Now she is torn between the man she loves and the woman she first loved.

Thread: My Rose

Thread: My Rose is the 1st part of the Sequel: Thread

The Purple Sea

Nothing - not her father, not the church - can stop unruly Angela from being with her childhood best friend turned great love, Sara. Based on a true story, Viola di Mare, presents a uniquely engaging portrait of family, community and gender roles in a 19th century Italian village.

The Boys in the Band

A witty, perceptive and devastating look at the personal agendas and suppressed revelations swirling among a group of gay men in Manhattan. Harold is celebrating a birthday, and his friend Michael has drafted some other friends to help commemorate the event. As the evening progresses, the alcohol flows, the knives come out, and Michael's demand that the group participate in a devious telephone game, unleashing dormant and unspoken emotions.

Na Parede da Memória

Past and present gets mixed up in the mind of poetess Martha, when she bumps into memories she didn't remember she had forgot, regarding her time alongside the young student Elouise.

Margarita with a Straw

A rebellious young woman with cerebral palsy leaves India to study in New York. On her journey of self-discovery, she unexpectedly falls in love.

Auroras

Constantly orbiting at 400 km (250 mi) above the earth, the ISS is perfectly situated to witness the beautiful streamers of green and red light emanating from the collision of highly charged solar wind particles with oxygen and nitrogen atoms in the earth's atmosphere. Centered about the northern (Aurora Borealis) and southern (Aurora Australis) poles the Auroras move in an almost hypnotic dance below the space station.

Swan Song

An aging hairdresser escapes his nursing home to embark on an odyssey across his small town to style a dead woman's hair for her funeral, rediscovering his sparkle along the way.

Denied

Troy, a recent high school graduate, is in love with his best friend Merrick, but Merrick isn't willing to be in a relationship with him. Troy is forced to deal with Merrick's selfishness, his own aching heart, and his unfulfilling life.

Even Cowgirls Get the Blues

A girl born with enormous thumbs in the repressive era of the 1950s learns to turn her quirks into assets.

Liz in September

A shocking secret, ex-lovers and the arrival of an outsider shake things up for Liz as she celebrates her birthday at a lesbian-owned resort.

Miao Miao

Struggling to adjust to her new life in Taipei, introverted high school girl Miao Miao opens up after meeting outgoing classmate Xiao Ai who becomes increasingly enamoured with her new friend. Unaware of Xiao Ai's confused feelings for her, Miao Miao falls for brooding CD shop owner Chen Fei, who seems determined to block out the world with a pair of headphones.

Totally F***ed Up

Gay, alienated Los Angeles teens have a hard time as their parents kick them out of their homes, they don’t have money, their lovers cheat, and they are harassed by gay-bashers.

Dipped in Gold

Lino Brocka's adaptation of Mars Ravelo's "komiks" melodrama about a successful businessman who is terrified of being exposed as a homosexual.

Lucky Bastard

Rusty is a successful architect with the life of his dreams. However, when his boyfriend leaves town, Rusty meets a mysterious drifter names Denny who opens Rusty up to a strange new world.

Boy Saint

A sumptuous short film of friendship and adoration between boys, based on a poem by Peter LeBerge. Moments of joy, bonding and roughhousing on a school trip to the beach counterpoint one teen boy’s introspective sexual awakenings and questionings. Magnificent cinematography and editing create a visual feast that provides the imagery for a narrated poem by Peter Laberge alluding to early homosexual desires, but with Catholic overtones never directly expressed.

Potato Dreams of America

A true story about a gay boy growing up in the collapsing USSR, his courageous mail-order bride mother, and their adventurous escape to Seattle in the 90s.

The Awakening of Spring

Based on the 1891 play "Spring Awakening," this filmed stage drama examines the tensions and confusion of young people as their growing sexual awareness conflicts with the repressive social environment around them. The passionate kiss between two males might be the first envisioned for the stage since Christopher Marlowe's between Edward II and Gaveston.

(Nie)znajomi

A group of seven friends come together for dinner. What starts out as a normal evening, evolves into something else when they decide to play a game and read all text messages aloud and answer all phone calls on speakerphone...

2 Cool 2 Be 4gotten

Felix is a friendless achiever in high school whose life changes after the arrival of the half-American Snyder brothers, entangling him in their dark ambitions.

The Boys in the Band

At a birthday party in 1968 New York, a surprise guest and a drunken game leave seven gay friends reckoning with unspoken feelings and buried truths.

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 Half of It

Shy, straight-A student Ellie is hired by sweet but inarticulate jock Paul, who needs help wooing the most popular girl in school. But their new and unlikely friendship gets tricky when Ellie discovers she has feelings for the same girl.

Appropriate Behavior

Shirin is struggling to become an ideal Persian daughter, politically correct bisexual and hip young Brooklynite but fails miserably in her attempt at all identities.

A Night in Four Parts

Two former high school buddies meet on a raki night in Beyoğlu after 17 years. As they drink and talk they realize another life is possible on a land where toxic masculinity does not exist. They represent the great divide in Turkish gay society: The lonely self-declared homosexuals and the married hypocrites.

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”.

Reflections in a Golden Eye

Bizarre tale of sex, betrayal, and perversion at a military post.

River Made to Drown In

Thaddeus Mackenzie, a wealthy lawyer, learns that he is dying and decides to sell all of his property and visit his old friend Allen Hayden. Allen is a struggling artist with a passion for life who once survived by working the streets, but now is romantically involved with Eva, a wealthy European gallery owner living in L.A. Thaddeus implores Allen to find Jamie, a young street hustler that Thaddeus had once tried to rescue. Allen returns to the streets to face the dark corners of his past where he must choose between what he left behind and the uncertainty that lies ahead.

To My Star

Actor Kang Seo Joon was once one of South Korea’s biggest and most popular stars, but his career is now in decline. But despite his fall in popularity, he believes he has had a change of fortune when he meets and falls for a dashing young chef named Han Ji Woo.

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.

An American Hate Crime

Jake, a college drop out, along with his friends decide to take their homophobia to a whole other level when when they decide to download a gay oriented social media app where they would lure and attack innocent victims. Noah, a just coming to terms gay teen, doesn't know who to talk to about his feelings and turns to the same social media app the attackers use on their prey. Told from both perspectives of the main characters and a chilling conclusion that will alter everyone's lives forever.

Bathroom Stalls & Parking Lots

Far from his home country of Brazil, a gay man goes on a San Francisco adventure with his friends in order to find the right hookup.

Edge of Seventeen

1984, Sandusky, Ohio. A naive 17-year-old navigates heartbreak and self-expression as he explores his sexuality.

The Child I Never Was

A serial killer dispassionately discusses the nuts and bolts of his grisly avocation, as well as the youthful traumas which helped to mold him into a psychopath, in this disturbing independent drama from Germany, based on the true story of of Germany's most famous child murderer Juergen Bartsch who, between the ages of 15 and 19, abused, tortured and killed four schoolboys in the Ruhr region of Germany from 1962 to 1966.

Ekaj

EKAJ is a love story between two drifters, a naive teenager and a hustler. Ekaj meets Mecca who takes him under his care. Mecca has AIDS and multiple problems of his own. He is high all day but still manages to be the only voice of reason in Ekaj’s hopeless world. They cruise the city together looking for money and places to stay. Although Ekaj makes some money as a prostitute, he finds himself discarded, and lacking what it takes to survive in the city. Their mutual loneliness leads to genuine friendship.

Hunter

Two friends vie for the attention of a stranger who passes out at their doorstep.

Young Soul Rebels

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

Eye of the Veil

After the sudden death of her pregnant partner, a closeted attorney must embrace her sexuality and humanity, as she seeks custody of their newborn.

Wasteland

Wasteland is a five-part anthology film that deals with isolation, mental illness, and the subjectivity of reality. Each of the five parts can be watched individually, but when viewed in sequence, each story brings out a more interesting and distinct context to its respective pieces.

I Can't Think Straight

Tala, a London-based Palestinian, is preparing for her elaborate Middle Eastern wedding when she meets Leyla, a young British Indian woman who is dating her best friend. Spirited Christian Tala and shy Muslim Leyla could not be more different from each other, but the attraction is immediate and goes deeper than friendship. But Tala is not ready to accept the implications of the choice her heart has made for her and escapes back to Jordan, while Leyla tries to move on with her new-found life, to the shock of her tradition-loving parents. As Tala's wedding day approaches, simmering tensions come to boiling point and the pressure mounts for Tala to be true to herself.

Ghosts... of the Civil Dead

The inmates and guards of a modern, clean and efficient maximum security wing are slowly and increasingly brutalized until they erupt in violence.

Sticky Matters

A girl is on the skids because of love. A short tempered and passionate young man falls in love with the girl. His emotions are so powerful that he is prepared to surrender his whole personality. The boy has a good friend, who is not sure whether their bond is friendly or homosexual. Before the girl arrived, the friendship was close, but now she has thrown a spanner in the works. How do they react to the new situation?

Uncle David

Ashley, a young man with a childlike mind arrives to stay with his uncle, David. Escaping from his abusive mother, He enters into a sexual relationship with his uncle who offers his insights into the world and the nature of reality. Eventually he tells his uncle that he wants to die, and the latter agrees to carry out the killing.

Synonymous With

A student's increasingly intimate line of questioning causes his interview with a local horror host to take a vulnerable turn.

Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train

A group of mourners travels by train to bury a recently deceased artist in Limoges. As they journey, secrets and desires unfold, with relationships shifting, past loves resurfacing, and personal connections revealed. At the funeral and afterward, tensions rise among the group, leading to further emotional complexities at the artist’s family home.

Another Country

In Moscow in 1983, an American journalist interviews Guy Bennett, who recalls his last year at public school, fifty years before, and how it contributed to him becoming a spy.

Defying Gravity

Popular frat guy Griff, the ultimate boy next boy, has a great big secret... Pete. Given an ultimatum by Pete, Griff goes the straight route until things get rough. Ultimately, defying reality is harder than he had ever imagined.

The Ring Thing

When Sarah accidentally proposes to her girlfriend in Provincetown, the mixup turns their loving relationship into a minefield of marital exploration.

The Commitment

Kasal is a slice of life drama of a gay couple whose resolve to stay together is challenged as they attend a wedding. It also is an examination on how a gay couple navigates through the different institutions in Philippine society.

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.

Almost Normal

A gay man approaching a mid-life crisis is tired of being different because he is gay. He wants to be normal. Suddenly he is yanked back in time to when he was in high school. But this time, the world is gay and to be straight is considered deviant behavior. Then something else happens. He meets a girl. And suddenly normal becomes ...well almost normal.

Dare

When a pompous actor tells good girl Alexa that she hasn't lived, she embarks on a bold journey that takes her to mysterious bad boy Johnny. Envious, her shy best friend Ben also dares to pursue Johnny.

Bridge of Destiny

Cuong is an admirable man. He has a successful career, a beautiful wife, and a good son. However, his life begins to turn upside down when he discovers Thang - a friend of his son is related to Trung, his gay lover in the past.

Nightstand

An unsettling portrait of a destructive three night affair between two men - one is gay, lost and adolescent, the other is married to a woman and middle-aged. Set in the heart of Soho, a fracturing queer landscape, Nightstand is a whirlwind of repressed yearnings and urban loneliness.

An Evening

Having slept together for the first time, two teenage boys must make sense of their evolving relationship.