La Revanche des Crevettes Pailletées (The Shiny Shrimps Strike Back) is directors Cedric Le Gallo and Maxine Govare’s excellent follow-up movie to 2019’s The Shiny Shrimps. The Shiny Shrimps are a queer motley-crew French water polo team and the first movie highlighted homophobia in sport. This movie continues in that vein of combining activism, sexy men in speedos and humor, and shines the spotlight on Putin’s state-sponsored homophobic terror in Russia. 

Matthias (Nicolas Gob) the handsome, straight team coach introduces a new player to the team, the hunky Selim (Bilal El Atreby), whom Matthias believes to be gay. We join the team as they journey from France to compete in the Tokyo Gay Games. The team manager has bought cheap airline tickets which involve a stop-over in Russia. Of course, things don’t go to plan and the team end up stranded in snowy, homophobic Russia. There they have to deal with ‘hunter’ queer bashers and the police, incarceration in, and an escape attempt from, a remote Russian Orthodox gay conversion camp/prison, ruled over by the formidable Madam Irina (Iryna Myshyna). They also have to work through each-others secrets and lies.

Le Gallo and Govare combine a tight, humorous script full of queer banter with great casting, stylish interior shots and high production and art direction values to highlight how tough life can be for queer people in Russia. A particularly poignant scene occurs in the toilets of a cool nightclub some of the team visit on their first night in Russia. The walls of the toilets are lined with photographs of young Russian clubbers who have been killed as a result of homophobia.  The scenes of electro-shock therapy in the conversion camp are also very moving. Putin’s ridiculous and shameful anti-gay laws are highlighted through humour and adventure/drama which is often an easier way to make a point than via a documentary. The movie was shot in France and the Russian scenes were actually shot in Ukraine (pre the Russian invasion), as it is illegal to shoot a movie like this in Russia. Eagle eyed viewers will spot references to other movies such as The Omen. An entertaining way to make a political point.

P..S. The Shiny Shrimps  Strike Back is the Closing Night Gala screening at OUTShine Film Fest in Fort Lauderdale

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Queerguru’s Contributing Editor Ris Fatah is a successful fashion/luxury business consultant  (when he can be bothered) who divides and wastes his time between London and Ibiza. He is a lover of all things queer, feminist, and human rights in general. @ris.fatah