An antidote to the heteronormative outlook of mainstream moviegoing, BFI Flare is the annual event in which our eyes turn to the wealth of queer films we’ll be looking out for in the year ahead.
Amongst the London-based festival’s line-up: Stephen Fry’s Willem and Frieda, a fascinating documentary about a gay painter and lesbian cellist who saved the lives of thousands of Jews from Nazi death camps. There’s also Life Unrehearsed, Jieun Banpark’s portrayal of two retired Korean nurses living their best lives in Berlin. Of the shorts that played, Andi Yi Li’s After Sunset Dawn Arrives, Cathy Dunne’s Where do all the old gays go, Guyana’s Eating Pawpaw On The Seashore and The Language, featuring Ballroom icon Jay Jay Revlon, caught our attention.
But that’s just a handful of many we loved. These are the finest documentaries and full-length features exploring the many facets of queer lives in 2023 and beyond.
Egghead and Twinkie
In this queer Gen Z romcom, the titular Twinkie (Sabrina Jie-A-Fa) is a 17-year-old lesbian who persuades her geeky best friend Egghead (Louis Tomeo) to drive her across the country to meet the woman of her dreams. It’s a pacy and charming movie that manages to examine Twinkie’s various intersections as an adopted, mixed-Asian queer woman with complexity and integrity but also humour and a light touch. A coming-out-slash-coming-of-age road movie, it’s an assured debut from its writer and director Sarah Kambe Holland. It should make stars of its leads too.
Peafowl
Queer representation in South Korean cinema can be traced back to the 60s, a period referred to as the Invisible Age. Today, in the Blockbuster Age the stories being told – like Cho Hyun-chul’s mesmerising The Dream Songs which was also part of Flare – and this, from award-winning director Byun Sung-bin, are far more direct in their depiction of LGBT+ lives. Seoul-based Ballroom star Shin, played by a compelling Hae-jun, is forced to return to her village for her father’s funeral, a place where she is not particularly welcome. Here, she slowly manages to calibrate her Buddhist upbringing with her queer present, bringing her family along with her. A poised and beautifully shot offering that navigates generational clashes with a sense of celebration, humour and hope.
Lotus Sports Club
If you only watch one documentary this year, make it this captivating, powerfully perceptive film from Cambodia’s Vanna Hem and his Italian counterpart Tommaso Colognese. In the city of Kampong Chhnang, we meet 61 year-old Pa Vann, a trans elder who runs both a football team and an open house for local queer teens estranged from their families. Filmed over five years, we see the sagacious Pa gently guide trans teenagers with both practical and emotional support. An incredibly moving yet uplifting insight into the lives of queer Cambodian teens, this will shift something inside of your soul.
Lie With Me
Acclaimed novelist Stephane Belcourt (César-winner Guillaume de Tonquédec) returns home for the first time in decades where he’s quickly confronted with the past; the ghost of his first love, the brooding, haunted Thomas (Julien de Saint-Jean). Director Olivier Peyon depicts the stunning French countryside as tenderly as the cast in this incredibly emotional reminder of how difficult things were, still are, for many of us. Comparable to Call Me by Your Name (and also based on a book, Philippe Besson’s autobiography of the same name) but actually good (sorry CMBYN fans, I stand by that statement).
Big Boys
Not to be confused with the Channel 4 series of the same name, this debut from writer-director Corin Sherman explores similar themes; namely, teenage sexuality and the importance of finding a solid straight ally in the coming out process. 14 year old Jamie (Isaac Krasner) and his older brother Will (Taj Cross) join their cousin Allie (Dora Madison) and her new boyfriend Dan (David Johnson III) on a weekend camping trip. After a shaky start, Jamie and Dan begin to bond over burgers and being ‘big boys’ as Jamie’s feelings transform from loathing to love. Sweet but not saccharine, it’s shaped by Isaac’s pitch-perfect performance which manages to be awkward, endearing and heroic all in one go.
The Stroll
Before the overpriced hotels and designer boutiques took over, New York’s Meatpacking District was home to numerous mostly Black, trans sex workers who populated 14th Street, or The Stroll as it was known. Thanks to her diligent, decades long research, co-director Kristen Lovell – who herself once walked those titular sidewalks – utilises her own and other excellent archives (including appearances from Sylvia Riviera) to reflect on life for those women who experienced both brutality and community on those streets in the 90s and 00s. It’s astonishing how quickly the area and that history has been gentrified. It’s why this is such an important and timely reminder of how precious trans rights, and lives, are.
Who I Am Not
This considered documentary featuring two South Africans – beauty queen Sharon-Rose Khumalo and intersex rights activist Dimakatso Sebidi – is one of several offerings at Flare that sensitively shatters many taboos about Intersex folx (also highly recommended: South Korea’s XX XY). Romanian director Tünde Skovrán evokes candid, intimate moments from both protagonists, managing to show the isolation, frustration and bigotry that Intersex people face – but also the warmth, pleasure and humour they experience.
Drifter
Set in the heart of Berlin’s queer community, this movie from Hannes Hirsh is unflinching in its approach to intimacy. Moritz (Lorenz Hochhuth) moves to the city to be with boyfriend Jonas (Gustav Schmidt) who abruptly decides he doesn’t really want a boyfriend after all. After a brief period of heartache, Moritz embarks on a journey of sexual self-discovery. Perhaps as important is his quest for queerness and a sense of his own identity, which slowly reveals itself through various interactions at clubs, parties and other queer spaces. This beautifully shot and edited after-hours offering is best at its quietest, where Lorenz’s distinguished portrayal of a 22-year-old drifter comes into its own.
A Place Of Our Own
Drawing from real-life experience, this Bhopal-set film from Ektara Collective, an independent group of filmmakers focused on marginalised and disenfranchised communities, follows friendsLaila (Manisha Soni), who works at an NGO, and housekeeper Roshni (Muskaan) who are inexplicably evicted from their home after a man attempts to break in. As the pair try to find a new place, we get a fascinating look at the city itself and the way in which the women travel through it, despite the complexities they face. As much a frank look at class, caste and gender inequities as it is the prejudice they face as trans women, sometimes violently so. Yet despite all they face, our heroes continue to prevail. This is, ultimately, a wonderful love letter to friendship and community.