Category: LGBTQ+ Movie Reviews

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The Craft: Legacy (2020)

2024 Entry #55 07-21-24 “The Craft: Legacy” is a 2020 American supernatural horror film, written and directed by Zoe Lister-Jones, who is openly queer. A legacy sequel to 1996’s “The Craft”, the film stars Cailee Spaeny, Gideon Adlon (“When We Rise”), Lovie Simone (“Orange is the New Black”), and openly trans Zoey Luna as four teenage girls who practice witchcraft as a coven. Additional cast members include Nicholas Galitzine (“Handsome Devil”, “Bottoms”, “Red, White & Royal Blue”, “Mary & George”), Michelle Monaghan (“Kiss Kiss Bang Bang”), and David Duchovny (“Twin Peaks”, “Sex and the City”, “Queer Duck: The Movie”), with Fairuza Balk (from the original film) making a cameo appearance as her character, Nancy.

This was a disappointment. The first film is a guilty pleasure of mine; a cute teenybopper horror flick with enough style to get by and enough fun performances to remain entertaining long after the fact. But this sequel lacks most of what made the original worthwhile. The performances are all over the place and most of the characters are either annoying or extremely underdeveloped, often both. The movie gets points for featuring a transgender witch and a male bisexual character but the former is one of those underdeveloped characters and the latter is murdered, so was it really worth it in the end? Lead actor Cailee Spaeny comes off the best and Nicholas Galitzine is fun while he’s around, but nearly everyone else is either totally wasted or feel like they might be in an entirely different film. Fairuza Balk has more charisma in her single scene than many of the main characters.

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Deadpool 2 (2018)

2024 Entry #54 07-21-24 “Deadpool 2” is a 2018 American superhero film based on the openly pansexual Marvel Comics character Deadpool. Distributed by 20th Century Fox, it is the sequel to “Deadpool” (2016) and, to my way of thinking, the thirteenth installment in the X-Men film series. The film was directed by David Leitch (“Atomic Blonde”) and written by Rhett Reese, Paul Wernick, and Ryan Reynolds, who all worked on the original “Deadpool” and the upcoming sequel “Deadpool & Wolverine”. Ryan Reynolds (“Buying the Cow”, “The Nines”, “Deadpool”, “Deadpool & Wolverine”) also stars in the title role alongside openly queer Brianna Hildebrand (as lesbian character Negasonic Teenage Warhead), Josh Brolin (“Milk”, “Women in Trouble”, “Avengers: Endgame”), Morena Baccarin (“Firefly”, “The Good Wife”, “Deadpool”, “Deadpool & Wolverine”), Zazie Beetz (“Black Mirror”) & T. J. Miller (“Deadpool”). In the film, Deadpool forms the X-Force to protect a young mutant from the time-traveling soldier Cable.

The Queer Factor: Wade Wilson / Deadpool is more openly pansexual in this sequel, hitting on men and women constantly. Additionally, Negasonic Teenage Warhead has a girlfriend in this film, Yukio (Shioli Kutsuna); all three of these queer characters will return in the upcoming sequel. Also, the film goes out of its way to paint the anti-mutant villains as a kind of gay conversion camp, and then the hero takes great joy in killing them.

The Sequel Factor: For what it is worth, I enjoyed the first film more than this one, but I do still enjoy this movie. They’re both entertaining and fun, hyper violent and sexual, but this film is a bit unfocused and not all of the jokes land. I have high hopes for the sequel though, which we’re planning on seeing in theaters this week.

Be sure to stick around through the credits for some essential information.

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Michael Lost and Found (2017)

2024 Entry #53 07-09-24 “Michael Lost and Found” is a 19 minute 2017 short documentary focusing on Mike Glatze, his wife Rebekah Glatze & Mike’s former lover, Benjie Nycum. The story of these 3 played out in the news and later in a 2015 film “I Am Michael”, which I’ve avoided because I thought I knew the whole story. Mike and Benjie were two of the main creative forces behind “XY Magazine”, which was aimed at gay youth in the 90’s, when I’d never seen anything like that before. I was just out of the target audience, being in my early 20s, but I collected the magazine because it made me feel like positive change was possible in what felt like a deeply conservative and anti-LGBTQ time in my country. However, Michael Glatze later announced he was no longer gay and that he was part of an anti-gay religion, which felt like a huge betrayal to many who found his work inspiring.

Having said all that, I saw that this documentary was available in my collection and gave it a shot and I found the piece quite healing. The conversations that are had are open, seemingly honest, and reveal the rest of Michael’s journey and Benjie’s honest connection with him. I will likely see the film adaptation of this story at some point. I very nearly watched it the next day, but so far it hasn’t happened.

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Birder (2023)

2024 Entry #52 07-09-24 “Birder” is a 2023 dramatic thriller which was written by Amnon Lourie and directed by Nate Dushku, both of whom served as producers on 2019’s “Maplethorpe”. The film stars Michael Emery (“The One”, “Petunia”, “Shameless”) as Kristian Brooks, a birdwatching serial killer who invades a nude queer campground in New Hampshire, ensnaring locals with his dark fetish, highlighting the dangers of consent.

The film sells itself as being in the same family as the superior 2013 French erotic thriller “Stranger by the Lake” and I loved that film so I gave this movie a chance. Unfortunately, the acting and directing in this are far lesser in this effort which means that it’s difficult to take any of this seriously and what could have been a very serious, very disturbing chiller becomes a comical demonstration in how not to make this type of film. There are glimmers here and there of what this movie could have been, however the poor acting and directing make the various kills wholly unbelievable (divesting them of any sense of danger or depth) and while there is nudity aplenty with several erections on display, the sex also fails to convince, which was just another reason why “Stranger by the Lake” blew this film out of the water.

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They / Them (2022)

2024 Entry #51 07-07-24 “They/Them” (or “They Slash Them”) is a 2022 American slasher film written and directed by the openly gay John Logan, in his feature directorial debut; he had previously been known as a critically acclaimed writer for film (“Gladiator”, “The Aviator”, “Skyfall”, “Spectre”, “Alien: Covenant”) & TV (“Penny Dreadful”, “Penny Dreadful: City of Angels”). The horror film follows a group of LGBTQ teens and a masked killer at a conversion camp and stars a host of LGBTQ talent, including non-binary actor Theo Germaine (“Work in Progress”, “The Politician”, “Adam”, “Holy Trinity”, “Equal”), openly gay Austin Crute (“Booksmart”, “Daybreak”), openly gay Cooper Koch (“Daddy”, “A New York Christmas Wedding”, “Swallowed”, “Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story”), openly trans actress Quei Tann, openly non-binary Darwin Del Fabro. The film also stars Kevin Bacon (“Queen’s Logic”, “Wild Things”, “Beauty Shop”, “Will & Grace”, “The Closer”, “Where the Truth Lies”, “The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special”, “RuPaul’s Drag Race”) & also features Carrie Preston (“My Best Friend’s Wedding”), Anna Chlumsky, Anna Lore, Monique Kim, Hayley Griffith, Boone Platt & Mark Ashworth.

The film is a fun & extremely queer take on films like “Friday the 13th”, which Kevin Bacon famously appeared in, only this time the film is very inclusive and the homophobic assholes are the villains – and while the film plays up the queer kids as victims, SPOILER, the only people that die have it coming – except for a poor dog who is shot in a bloodless offscreen death that is once again used to demonstrate who the villains are.

I had a good time watching this, but it’s not what I was expecting. The film is relatively tame as far as gore goes, which feels odd for this genre. And while the film plays up the evils of gay conversion, and the idea that the campers are safe in a Friday the 13th rip-off may seem refreshing but that twist is kind of lame too because at times it feels like nothing is happening. One of the other things I didn’t like was that there are several campers in the group who never speak or they aren’t developed enough to qualify as characters, even in scenes that would suggest that they would have to talk. I found myself wondering who those characters were and so anytime they showed up and continued to not talk it annoyed me. But this a pretty harmless movie all things considered with a lot of positive messaging and a few minor scares.

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Break Me / Knus meg (2018)

2024 Entry #50 07-06-24 “Break Me” (aka “Knus meg”) is a 15 minute 2018 dramatic short Norwegian film which was directed by Irasj Asanti (“Inkognitiv”, “Eyewitness” / “Øyevitne”) who co-wrote the film with Nina Anderson. The story concerns young kurdish immigrant and closeted homosexual cage fighter Mansour (Ravdeep Singh Bajwa) who must choose between his head and his heart (Fredrik Skogsrud as Andreas) after his father discovers the truth.

Short and to the point, at turns sexy and heartbreaking, this is one of those shorts that walks a fine line.

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Interview with the Vampire: Part II (2024)

2024 Entry #49 07-01-24 “Interview with the Vampire: Part II” is the second season of AMC’s adaptation of the 1976 vampire novel and is far more LGBTQ friendly than even the source material, which I loved as a kid for its coded queer characters – and which are made wholly, wonderfully, devastatingly central in this version of the story. This season mainly adapts the second half of the first Vampire Chronicles novel. Season 3 has been ordered and will adapt “The Vampire Lestat”. A spin-off series, “The Talamasca”, is in the works and this series has some ties to “The Mayfair Witches”, AMC’s adaptation of Anne Rice’s “Lives of the Mayfair Witches” trilogy – but sadly, I can’t recommend the latter as it struggles as an adaptation and fails as an attempt at quality television. Season 3 of this series will likely be out in 2026.

Edit: I’ve added a viewing order guide of Anne Rice’s Immortal Universe!

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Thelma & Louise (1991)

2024 Entry #48 06-09-24 “Thelma & Louise” is a 1991 American crime drama film directed by Ridley Scott and written by Callie Khouri. The film stars Susan Sarandon (“The Rocky Horror Picture Show”, “The Hunger”, “Cradle Will Rock”, “Cloud Atlas”) and Geena Davis (“Tootsie”, “Will & Grace”, “She-Ra and the Princesses of Power”) as Louise and Thelma, two friends who embark on a road trip that ends up in unforeseen circumstances. The supporting cast includes Harvey Keitel (“Pulp Fiction”), Michael Madsen (“Sin City”), Christopher McDonald (“The Boys Next Door”), and Brad Pitt (“Less Than Zero”, “Interview with the Vampire”, “The Mexican”, “The Normal Heart”). Filming took place in California and Utah from June to August 1990.

I wanted to revisit this film more than 30 years after first seeing it because I remembered several of my lesbian friends having stickers and magnets that said “Thelma & Louise LIVE” on them, and also having seen “The Celluloid Closet” many times over in which Susan Sarandon discusses putting the big kiss in at the end of the film. It surprised me to see that there are no LGBTQ characters in this movie. Even the much lauded kiss is between two women that the film goes out of its way to present as heterosexual and are kissing in a show of solidarity before they drive off a cliff together and presumably die. I think this, sadly, just goes to show how in the early 90s, queer audiences were starved for images of ourselves and would glom onto anything that remotely suggested homosexuality. It’s still a good film, but it just serves to remind me of exactly how far we’ve come.

Still, that connection between LGBTQ+ audience members and this film has made it something of an icon.

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Chris & Don: A Love Story (2007)

2024 Entry #47 06-07-24 “Chris & Don: A Love Story” is a 2007 documentary film that chronicles the lifelong relationship between author Christopher Isherwood (“A Single Man”, “Christopher and His Kind”, “Cabaret”) and his much younger lover, artist Don Bachardy. Chris & Don combines present-day interviews, archival footage shot by the couple from the 1950s, excerpts from Isherwood’s diaries, and playful animations to recount their romance. It was directed by Guido Santi and Tina Mascara, and was the centerpiece film at NewFest, the New York LGBTQ Film Festival, in 2008.

Watching this documentary, which focuses on one of the first openly gay couples in Hollywood, I was at first shocked at the 20 year age difference between the two men and worried that it might have been predatory, but the more I saw and then read, it felt much more like there were so few options for love between men at that time, that the age difference didn’t matter. Indeed, Isherwood’s experiences and how they brought him to Bachardy were quite compelling. Both participants were aware and accepting of the other, with much of the story being told by Don Bachardy, the surviving half of the couple as he clearly continues to mourn the loss of his partner. The shades of love that are expressed in the stories he chooses to share are often surprising, sexy, graphic and innocent. With other contributors including the likes of Liza Minelli and John Boorman. Sweet.

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Mona Lisa Smile (2003)

2024 Entry #46 06-06-24 “Mona Lisa Smile” is a 2003 American drama film produced by Revolution Studios and Columbia Pictures in association with Red Om Films Productions, directed by Mike Newell (“The Good Father”, “Four Weddings and a Funeral”, “An Awfully Big Adventure”), written by Lawrence Konner and Mark Rosenthal, and starring Julia Roberts (“Sleeping with the Enemy”, “My Best Friend’s Wedding”, “The Mexican”, “The Normal Heart”), Kirsten Dunst (“Interview with the Vampire”, “Bring It On”, “Wimbledon”, “The Power of the Dog”), Julia Stiles (“The Lake”), and Maggie Gyllenhaal (“Happy Endings”). The film follows Julia Roberts as Katherine Ann Watson, a 30-year-old woman who takes an Art History teaching position at Wellesley College in 1953. We see her life affecting and affected (am I using the right words?) by her students, her lovers and her coworkers, one of whom is a widowed lesbian, played by Juliet Stevenson (“Food of Love”, “Bend It Like Beckham”, “Infamous”, “Departure”).

I remember renting this movie and feeling like it never quite arrived by the time it was finished. But I’ve re-watched it twice since then and I’ve enjoyed it more each time. Still, I hadn’t seen it in about 15 years when I remembered Juliet Stevenson’s character and decided to revisit it again for this project. I’m glad I did. This was fun.

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