15 movies that are not Brokeback Mountain or Blue is the Warmest Color
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All About My Mother (Todo Sobre Mi Madre)Viewed by many critics and cinephiles as Pedro Almodóvar's best film, All About My Mother is a meditation on the beauty and complexity of women and how some lucky men are endowed with that same mix of softness and grit. It is told through the experiences of Manuela (Argentinian actress Cecilia Roth), who loses and gains children, lovers, and friends during an odyssey through Madrid and Barcelona. The protagonist also encounters AIDS and drugs, but the tale doesn't feel soapy, only heartfelt. All the characters face life with a passion and resolve that feels uniquely Spanish. With beautiful cinematography and near-perfect performances, out director Almodovar proved himself a global treasure with this film.
Available on Netflix Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Italy
CarolIn this adaptation of the novel "The Price of Salt" by Patricia Highsmith, Therese (Rooney Mara), a young department-store clerk in 1950s Manhattan, meets Carol (Cate Blanchett), a beautiful older woman stuck in a depressing marriage of convenience. As their bond deepens and they become romantically involved, Carol finds the strength to leave her husband (Kyle Chandler). Unfortunately, her spouse starts to raise questions about her fitness as a mother when he realizes that Carol's relationships with her best friend Abby (Sarah Paulson) and Therese are more than just friendships. Voted
Best LGBT Movie by the BFI.
CircumstanceAtafeh and her brother, Mehran, have grown up privileged, in a home filled with music, art, and intellectual curiosity. While Atafeh dreams of fame and adventure, and she and her best friend, Shireen, explore Tehran's underground scene with youthful exuberance and determination to be themselves, her brother returns home from drug rehab, renounces his former decadent life, and replaces his once obsessive practice of classical music with more destructive pursuits.
Desert HeartsDonna Deitch's directorial debut is the first "real" lesbian film (an out lesbian, nobody dies, two women have sex). Based on lesbian author Jane Rule’s novel, Desert of the Heart follows Vivian (Helen Shaver), a repressed divorcee waiting out the legal finalities in a ranch guesthouse in 1950s Nevada. Vivian is all class and repression, and the ranch owner warns her to stay away from her irrepressible lesbian daughter Cay (Patricia Charbonneau, wearing jean shorts and cowboy boots and a whole lot of lesbian lust). Turns out, that’s who she’s drawn to, and soon Cay is unrepressing Viv in the first real lesbian sex scene in a film. Their growing relationship played against the rocky red soil and rolling landscape doesn’t necessarily have a future, but it’s the sight of Vivian’s slow but seismic sexual awakening that makes this film Deitch’s valentine to the rest of us.
Far From HeavenGay writer-director Todd Haynes pays worthy homage to the 1950s melodramas of Douglas Sirk. Julianne Moore is exquisite as a suburban housewife whose life is upended when she discovers her husband (Dennis Quaid) is gay, and she finds herself attracted to a black gardener (Dennis Haysbert). Haynes does it all in the lush Sirk style, while addressing issues that stayed under the radar of '50s films.
Go FishOne of the most important lesbian films of all time, the indie romantic drama Go Fish was lauded when it came out in the early 1990s as the first film about being a lesbian and helped mirror conversations happening in the real world about butch-femme dichotomies, familial pressures for queers of color, owning lesbian history, and why lesbians who sleep with men get lambasted.
Happy TogetherThe story of two passionate, on-again-off-again lovers won Best Director for Wong Kar-wai at Cannes. It follows Yiu-Fai and Po-Wing on a trip to Argentina that seems to leave the couple falling apart. On a list of the 50 most essential gay films from Out magazine, playwright Tony Kushner described Happy Together's leading men enthusiastically. "The actors are both brilliant, funny, and terrifically moving, irritating and endearing," he wrote. "They bicker, battle, and make love with complete abandon, and — well, why not say it? — they’re the sexiest gay couple ever filmed."
My Own Private IdahoGay director Gus Van Sant's meandering story follows River Phoenix, who plays Mike, a troubled gay street hustler, and his best friend (played by Keanu Reeves) from the streets of Portland to Seattle to Italy and Idaho. Along the way, the film explores love and loss, betrayal and the street life a lot of LGBT kids find themselves in. It's a bit of a gay Easy Rider and a must-see; poignant, emotional, frustrating, and don't expect a happy ending.
PariahPariah, a coming-of-age tale about a 17-year-old black lesbian in Brooklyn, N.Y., is a breakthrough film that is marked by a strong performance from actress Adepero Oduye, who, as the protagonist Alike, explores and eventually embraces her sexuality within an environment where the stakes of such honesty are high. When Alike finally reveals her true self to her parents, the results are both heartbreaking and hopeful. Written and directed by Dee Rees and produced by Spike Lee, Pariah was lauded by critics, who praised how it imbued the familiar narrative of coming out with a freshness and vitality that resonated with audiences regardless of sexual orientation.
Available on Netflix US
Paris is BurningThis documentary shone a bright light on the African-American, Latino, and LGBT communities involved in the New York City ball culture of the mid-to-late 1980s. Directed by Jennie Livingston, Paris Is Burning brought an underground aspect of LGBT culture to the mainstream. From the use of slang (“serving realness”) to unforgettable quotes (“reading is fundamental”), the film has had a lasting impact on both LGBT and mainstream pop culture.
Saving FaceYes, a lesbian rom-com! Wilhelmina Pang (Michelle Krusiec) is a surgeon living in Manhattan whose mother (Joan Chen) is eager for her to settle down with a nice man and get married. What Ma doesn't know is that Wilhelmina happens to be a lesbian -- or rather, Ma prefers not to acknowledge it, since she once walked in on Wilhelmina and her girlfriend several years before. As it happens, Wilhelmina is looking for someone special in her life, and thinks she may have found her in Vivian (Lynn Chen), a beautiful dancer, but a fear of commitment and a desire to keep her medical career on track is making their relationship problematic. As Wilhelmina tries to get her love life in order, her mother's shifts into crisis mode. Ma, a 48-year-old widow, has just discovered she's pregnant, and her staunchly traditional father (Li Zhiyu) will not allow her back into the home they share until she's married someone respectable. Unwilling to name the father of her baby, Ma is forced to move in with Wilhelmina, and while enduring the emotional roller coaster of pregnancy she is being pressured by friends and relatives to marry Cho (Nathaniel Geng), a sweet but boring man she doesn't especially like.
TangerineTangerine is a 2015 American comedy-drama film directed by Sean S. Baker and written by Baker and Chris Bergoch, starring Kitana Kiki Rodriguez, Mya Taylor, and James Ransone. The story follows a transgender sex worker who discovers her boyfriend and pimp has been cheating on her. The film was shot with three iPhone 5s smartphones.
Available on Netflix Canada, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Italy, USA, Netherland, Belgium, Spain, Japan, Russia, Poland
The Way He Looks (Hoje Eu Quero Voltar Sozinho)A Brazilian coming-of-age romantic drama film based on the 2010 short film I Don't Want to Go Back Alone (Eu Não Quero Voltar Sozinho). Leonardo is a blind teenager searching for independence. His everyday life, the relationship with his best friend, Giovana, and the way he sees the world change completely with the arrival of Gabriel.
Available on Netflix US and Brazil
Watch the short film
here.
TomboyA French family with two daughters, 10-year-old Laure and 6-year-old Jeanne, moves to a new neighborhood during the summer holidays. With her Jean Seberg haircut and tomboy ways, Laure is immediately mistaken for a boy by the local kids and passes herself off as Michael. Filmmaker Céline Sciamma brings a light and charming touch to this drama of childhood gender confusion. Zoe Heran as Laure/Michael and Malonn Levanna as Jeanne are nothing less than brilliant. This is a relationship movie: relationships between children, and the even more complicated one between one's heart and body.
Available on Netflix Canada, Brazil, Germany and Italy
WeekendThis beautifully restrained film tells the story of two young gay British men who meet at a club, hook up, and fall in love over the course of an eventful weekend. One of the guys is introverted and half-closeted, while the other is brash, gregarious, and wears his sexuality on his sleeve; their worldviews complement each other and their chemistry is explosive. Through passionate conversations, many drug-fueled, they alternately challenge, confuse, and confound each other. It's a grown-up, no-holds-barred exploration of modern love between men, and even the sex is honest. Directed by Andrew Haigh, who's moved on to executive-produce HBO's Looking, the film well deserved its status as a critical darling.
Available on Netflix Canada, US, Australia, New Zealand and the Netherlands
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