Tag: Gay Shorts

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“The Den” aka “La tana” (2015)

2024 Entry #007 01-04-24 “The Den” (aka “La tana”) is a 15 minute 2015 Italian short film which was directed by Lorenzo Caproni (“La prima volta”, “The Necklace”, “Lazarus Come Out”) who co-wrote it with Fabio Marson. The story follows Christian (Daniele Mariani), who on a vacation to the beach with his wife (Laura Sinceri) and son (Nicola Luna Maroder) encounters his old friend Luca (Emanuel Caserio), who he had a complex sexual history with… and history often repeats itself.

This is part of the same collection as the previous short I watched, but I liked this entry much better. It left me with many questions about the characters, as shorts often do, but it felt natural. There’s a dangerous edge to the proceedings here but it appears to have a relatively happy ending and I’m not knocking it.

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“Lolo” (2019)

2024 Entry #006 01-04-24 “Lolo” is a 14 minute 2019 German short film which was written and directed by both Leandro Goddinho & Paulo Menezes who went on to create other queer shorts with “It Is Not the Brazilian Homosexuals Who Are Perverse, But the Situation in Which They Live” & “Du Bist So Wunderbar”. The story focuses on Lolo (Zev Starrett), who is an openly gay 11-year-old boy trying to convince Max (Valentin von Schönburg), his first love, to go public with their relationship at the school party, while also spending time with his close friends, Toby (Sam Atlas) and Elena (Rhea C. Tober).

So, this was mostly horrible. The entire cast is made up of children and their performances are not good but with this script it’s hard to blame them for any of this. I do like the poster and the cinematography isn’t horrendous, and I did also like one of the settings – but I wish all of these elements were part of a better film, because this is just scraping the bottom of the barrel.

I purchased this short from Amazon Prime a couple of years ago as part of a gay short film collection titled “The Male Gaze: Hide and Seek”. I hope the other entries are better than this one.

Skip it.

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“Aikāne” (2023)

2024 Entry #003 01-03-24 “Aikāne” is a 14 minute 2023 animated short film based on a mythical love and adventure story rooted in the Hawaiian tradition of aikāne, or intimate partners of the same sex. Co-directors Hamer and Wilson, a married couple, were inspired to make the film by their belief that everybody, especially young people, deserve to see a queer love story with a happy ending. The film was produced by Hinaleimoana Kwai Kong Wong-Kalu, also known as Kumu Hina, who is a Native Hawaiian māhū – a traditional third gender person who occupies “a place in the middle” between male and female, as well as a modern transgender woman.

The story follows a valiant warrior, wounded in battle against foreign invaders, who falls deep into a mysterious underwater world. When the octopus who rescues him transforms into a handsome young man, they fall in love and an epic adventure begins.

This was charming, brief and unexpectedly lovely. I know nothing of Hawaiian mythology and was not expecting the sea creature love story – but it was cool nonetheless.

The film has been awarded at multiple children’s, indigenous, LGBTQ+ and other film festivals around the world, and has qualified for the 96th Academy Awards by winning top jury awards at the New Hampshire and Hawaii International Film Festivals.

“Aikāne” is currently streaming for free on YouTube.

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Violets (2017)

2022 Entry #023 02-01-22 “Violets” is a 23 minute 2017 short which was written & directed by Maren H. Jensen. The story focuses on Scott St. Patrick’s John, a police officer, son, husband and father who is struggling with gender identity…and how that struggle affects those around him.

Wow. This was great! I’d really like a feature length version of this. I thought this had some really interesting things to say and I loved how it ended.

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Walk For Me (2016)

2022 Entry #020 02-01-22 “Walk For Me” is a 12 minute 2016 short film which was written and directed by Elegance Bratton (“Pier Kids”, “Buck”). The film is a contemporary coming out story about a trans girl named Hassan (Aaliyah King) who explores her identity voguing under the name Hanna and must make some difficult but intuitive decisions about how she will allow herself to be seen and how she will allow herself to be addressed.

Another great short! This was such a nice surprise. And I would welcome a feature length version.

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In Beating Cells (2017)

2022 Entry #017 01-31-22 “In Beating Cells” is a 25 minute 2017 short German film which was directed by Richard Kranzin. The plot follows 4 friends as they take a trip to the country. The friends are Rico (Philipp Kronenberg), Julia (Linn Reusse), Friedrich (Lukas Sperber) & Eva (Zarina Zöller). Rico & Eva feel free in the country, Julia is cool with it but is looking forward to returning to the city and Friedrich is conflicted between his attraction to Rico (which is reciprocated without judgment by the others) and his girlfriend back home.

“We all get lost…with beating hearts…in beating cells. This small world, this pulsating membrane. Even in one leaf there are thousands. I want to feel it…before we forget it.”

I liked this one a lot. Sometimes shorts feel like fragments of something better…or like a rough draft that need not be developed to fruition, but given the poetry that flows through this piece, I felt it was perfect as is. That’s not to say that I wouldn’t welcome a feature length version, but it’s one of those shorts that accomplishes a lot in a very short amount of time.

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Golden Boys (2016)

2022 Entry #011 01-29-22 “Golden Boys” is a 9 minute 2016 short which was written by Andrew Musselman & directed by Jill Riley. The plot concerns three men breaking into their old school to memorialize the death of a boy they bullied (often suggesting that he was gay) despite (or because of) the fact that they might be gay themselves.

I wish I enjoyed this more. The actors are fine and there are some nice images but I found the fragmented story confusing and it felt like I was missing a big piece of the story. The IMDB summary features several critical details that I don’t think were featured in the actual film, or at the very least, they weren’t made clear enough for this audience member.

I rented this from Amazon Prime; it’s part of the collection “The Male Gaze: Three’s Company”, which I’ll likely continue with soon.

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Four Quartets (2018)

2022 Entry #003 01-03-22 “Four Quartets” is a 2018 11 minute short that was written and directed by Marco Alessi. The story covers a night out in a club as Raf (Laurie Kynaston) struggles to find his place among the crowd and learns that everything will fall into place if he just lets himself go with the flow.

This was cute. But I had misread the title as “Four Quarters” and kept waiting for the quarters to come into play! Lol Then, reading the title again, everything made much more sense, although I felt like a moron.

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Jermain and Elsie (2017)

2022 Entry #002 01-02-22 “Jermain and Elsie” is a 2017 21 minute short which was written by Ashley Campbell and Adele Silva; directed by Leon Lopez (“Soft Lad”). The short focuses on the unexpected friendship between a sexually ambiguous caregiver and his racist elderly invalid client. Jermain, the caregiver, is practically saintly, but has his own troubles, which reveals hidden depths in Elsie.

I liked this well enough. I was entertained.

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Caught Looking (1992)

2022 Entry #001 01-01-22 “Caught Looking” is a 1992 35 minute short which was written by Paul Hallam and directed by Constantine Giannaris. The story is somewhat confusing but features a man sitting at a computer and he logs into what seems to be an interactive sexual game called “Caught Looking” and then guides his virtual self through various scenarios. At least, I think that’s what was happening. It’s a bit of early 90s queer cyberpunk.

I watched this short over a 24hour period in which I was struggling with a horrible migraine. I’d been unable to receive my medication which had curtailed most of my migraine symptoms for several years and they all came rushing back at once, including scary visual manifestations. In addition to the migraine struggles, the audio for the film was split; the dialogue and music were in one ear while just the music was in the other, making it difficult to understand the dialogue so I ended up listening with just one headphone…so it was a bit awkward. When I later resumed the title I used a mono speaker system which helped.

At varying times I found this piece to be hypnotic, impenetrable, impressive, disappointing, inspired, sexy, dull and a whole host of other contradictory things. YMMV.

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