Brazilian queer filmmaker Thiago Cazado is a remarkably talented young man.  Not only has he written and co-directed his sophomore film but he has starred in it too playing a teenager almost half his age (33 years).   

Cousins is a cute queer romance that may not tax your imagination with it’s light and predictable plot, but it has enough charm for it to  become a crowd pleaser.

Lucas  (Paulo Sousa) is one of those seemingly perfect young men who couldn’t melt butter in his mouth.  He’s been orphaned so now  lives with his  very religious Aunt Lourdes who holds prayer meetings in her house. One day she announces that Mario another nephew is coming to stay for a few days as he is not welcomed at his own home now that he has just been released from Jail for an unspecified crime

Mario turns up just after Aunt has gone away on a religious retreat for a few days and although Lucas may not be sure what is about to happen next, we are.  There is an immediate chemistry between the two teens and it doesn’t take them long to get naked and treat us to a very erotic soapy bathtub scene.

It may have started off a simple sexual attraction but it soon becomes obvious that by the time Aunt returns, the boys have fallen hook line and sinker for each other.  However Mario has competition for Lucas’s affection as Julia (Duda Esteves) .a young girl he has been giving piano lessons too is completely smitten with him and is determined to have sex with him one way or another.

This is a very homoerotic gay romance with a fair amount of full-front nudity so  so we know that Julia is not going to get anywhere, and the real surprise is the  really cute ending that Cazado planned for us.

A perfect date night movie.