It’s not that we have anything against Mr Franco but frankly some of his recent Sundance LGBT movies really stank. In 2015 his I Am Michael the story of Michael Glatze the ex gay activist who became an obnoxious born-again Christian, was so poor that it never saw the light of day after playing a few Film Festivals. Last year his King Cobra, also directed by Justin Kelly, and based on the the life of pornstar Brent Corrigan was so bad that it got laughs in all the young places, but somehow it did get released on DVD.
This year the packed program of queer cinema looks fascinating and with no duds in sight. In fact one of them, Call Me By Your Name, has already been snapped up by Sony Pictures Classics for a theatrical release later this year. Here then are queerguru’s picks for what we think will be the best LGBT movies, and also films by queer filmmakers, at the Festival.
Call Me By Your Name is the story of a 17-year-old boy living in Italy during the 1980s who meets Oliver, a 24-year-old academic who has come to stay at his parents’ villa, and a passionate relationship develops between them. Co-written by James Ivory and Luca Guadagnino who also directs and stars Armie Hammer as Oliver and introducing Timothée Chalamet as Elio.
From the UK comes God’s Own Country which is the story of Yorkshire farmer’s lad Johnny who has shut down emotionally to ensure the survival of his family’s struggling farm. When migrant laborer Gheorghe arrives to help with lambing time, an intense emotional relationship erupts between the two men, forcing Johnny to confront what it feels like to love and be loved for the first time. It is the feature directing debut of actor Francis Lee, and the movie stars rising young Brit actor Josh O’Connor and swarthy Romanian actor Alec Secareanu.
Matt Wolf’s documentary Bayard & Me is premiered in Sundance’s Shorts Program. It tells the story Bayard Rustin who was the organizer of the March on Washington and one of the leaders of the civil rights movement, who in the 1980s adopted his younger boyfriend Walter Naegle to obtain the legal protections of marriage. In this intimate love story, Walter remembers Bayard and a time when gay marriage was inconceivable.
Larger than life NY cabaret performer and actress Bridget Everett who is a major gay icon, stars in two movies that premieres in Sundance this year. Patti Cake$ is a story right out of New Jersey of an aspiring rapper fighting through a world of strip malls and strip clubs on an unlikely quest for glory, and that received rave reviews and several bids until it was bought by Fox Searchlight. Everett also co-stars with Toni Collette and Molly Shannon and hottie Adam Levine in a buddy comedy called Fun Mom Dinner.
Queer filmmaker Dee Rees, whose first feature Pariah was the talk of Sundance in 2011, and who racked up 4 Emmy nominations for her HBO film Bessie, premiered her new movie Mudbound to absolute rave reviews. This epic story about two 1940s Mississippi farming families, one white, the other black, takes place at a particular time in American history when poor white men felt their standing threatened by their hard-working black neighbors, and when laws were passed to keep blacks down — or mudbound. It stars Carey Mulligan, Garret Hedlund and an almost unrecognizable Mary J Blige.
Variety Magazine titled their Sundance review of Beach Rats the sophomore feature from NY filmmaker Eliza Hittman ‘A Head-Turning Debut in a Heartbreaking Gay Drama’. They were talking about British newcomer Harris Dickinson who makes a stunning impression as an aimless teenager on the outer edges of Brooklyn struggles to escape his bleak home life and navigate questions of self-identity, as he balances his time between his delinquent friends, a potential new girlfriend, and older men he meets online.
Five episodes of a intriguing new webseries The Chances debuted at Sundance. Best friends Kate and Michael, who are deaf, try their best to see their friendship through new changes in their lives as Kate adjusts to being newly married, and Michael attempts to get over his ex-boyfriend. Created and written by Josh Feldman and Shoshannah Stern who also star in it alongside Aaron Costa Ganis and Lucas Near-Verbrugghe (who played the two ex lovers in Lazy Eye) plus Darryl Stephens & Wilson Cruz.
Watch this space for further details when all these movies get released.
