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Other Films of Interest
If you enjoyed the film 'Beautiful Thing', then here is a list of some
other gay-themed films which you might enjoy, including some of my
personal favourites.
(P.S. to purchase any of the films, just click on the picture and you
will be taken to amazon.co.uk)
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Maurice (the Merchant Ivory Collection)
[1987] Two male English
school friends find themselves falling in love at Cambridge. To
regain his place in society, Clive gives up his forbidden love,
Maurice (pronounced "Morris") and marries. While staying with Clive
and his shallow wife, Anne, Maurice finally discovers romance in the
arms of Alec, the gamekeeper. Written from personal pain, it's E.M.
Forster's story of coming to terms with sexuality in the Edwardian
age. |
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Defying Gravity [1999]
Griff and Pete, members of a fraternity at USC, are having an
affair. Griff is closeted, and still lives at the frathouse. Pete
has left the frathouse, and is on the verge of coming out. He want
more from Griff than just sex. Griff is unwilling to have a real
relationship (complete with dating, dining, acknowledging a
partner), but does not give up on pursuing Pete. Pete even gets
Griff to meet him at a gay coffeehouse. Then comes the gaybashing
incident that changes everything. |
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Get Real [1999]
This tenderly romantic film tells the story of Steve, a young man in
a British prep school, as he struggles with coming out and falling
in love with the class jock, John... who, amazingly, falls in love
with him as well. |
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The Trip [2002]
When 19-year-old gay-rights activist Tommy and 24-year-old Alan
first meet in 1973, they find themselves on the opposite sides of
the political coin. Despite their many differences, they form a
loving long-term relationship. In 1977, during Anita Bryant's
crusade, an anti-gay book Alan wrote years before gets published
without his consent. The book destroys Tommy's credibility as a
well-known activist, resulting in Tommy and Alan's break-up. Seven
years later, Alan is given a second chance, a reunion with Tommy and
the opportunity to set things right. |
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Bedrooms and Hallways [1999]
A man (Kevin McKidd) enters therapy after many failed relationships
and is disconsolate about having any social life. In the group
session, he comes clean about his feelings for another group member
(James Purefoy) which leads to a homosexual affair. Then the
situation is complicated by the re-union with his original high
school sweetheart (Jennifer Ehle) and the whole thing transcends
into sexual ambiguity. |
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Queer As Folk [1999]
Two gay friends, Vince and Stuart, live on a cocktail of sex, drugs
and clubbing. They are both 29, and Stuart is the type of guy who
cops off every time he goes out. One night, he spots 15-year-old
Nathan, and brings him back to his apartment where they make love.
Now, Nathan is still after Stuart, but Stuart just thinks of Nathan
as one in a long line of one night stands. |
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The Mudge Boy
[2003] The film follows the
story of Duncan, a fourteen-year-old misfit farm boy trying to fill
the void and alleviate the numbness left by his mother's passing.
Unable to let her go quite yet, Duncan mimics his dead mother. He
talks in her voice at the dinner table and wears her fur coat to
bed. Edgar, Duncan's distant sixty-year-old father, doesn't
understand the strange manifestations of his son's mourning. Why
can't Duncan grieve like a normal person? Edgar becomes intent on
laying down some new rules and turning his coddled son into someone
who can take on the family farm. |
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Close To Leo [2003]
When 21 year-old Leo, the oldest of four brothers, announces to his
rural French family that he's HIV+ family bonds are tested. The
family decides that 11 year Marcel, the youngest, is too young to
understand and the family agrees to keep the unsettling news from
him. Marcel overhears enough to understand that something amiss with
Leo and when the two travel to Paris together, Marcel confronts Leo
with what he suspects. |
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Brokeback Mountain [2005]
Set against the sweeping vistas of Alberta's Rocky Mountains, this
film tells the story of two young men - a ranch-hand and a rodeo
cowboy - who meet in the summer of 1963 and unexpectedly forge a
lifelong connection, one whose complications, joys and tragedies
provide a testament to the endurance and power of love. |
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The Fluffer [2002]
The story, set in the world of adult entertainment, centers around
three characters: Johnny Rebel, a straight man who has become a star
in the world of gay porn; Johnny's stripper girlfriend Babylon; and
Sean, a naive young man in love with Johnny, who ends up becoming
Johnny's "fluffer". |
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Trick [2000]
Gabriel, an aspiring writer of Broadway musicals, meets Mark, a
muscled stripper, who picks him up on the subway. They spend the
night trying to find somewhere to be alone... forced to contend with
Gabriel's selfish roommate, his irritating best friend, and a
vicious, jealous drag queen in a gay dance club. The sun rises on a
promising new relationship. |
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Mysterious Skin
[2004] In 1981, in Hutchinson,
Kansas, an eight year old boy, Neil McCormick is sexually abused by
his pedophile baseball coach and his deranged and promiscuous mother
does not pay attention. Meanwhile, the also eight year old Brian
Lackey awakes from a brief amnesia of four hours with a bleeding
nose, but his negligent father does not pay attention to the event.
Brian grows-up believing he had been abducted by aliens. The gay
Neil grows-up as a hustler. When Brian is eighteen years old, he
looks for and meets Neil, who discloses dark innermost secrets of
their past. |
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Mandragora [1997]
Marek is a troubled teenager who is having trouble at home and at
school and he realizes he's much different than they are. His father
finds out Marek has stopped going to school and tries to talk some
sense into him. Talking turns into yelling and this pushes Marek
further and further away and decides to runaway from home, which
takes him into the dark underworld and streets of Prague. In Prague,
Marek is drugged, raped and forced into a life of hustling for
money, where AIDS is always a threat. |
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Lilies [1996]
In a men's prison a Bishop is lured into hearing the dying
confession of a prisoner. He is then held captive by the gay people
in the prison and forced to watch a play which is about a gay
triangle in a boy's school thirty years earlier... |
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Edge of Seventeen [1998]
A gay teen finds out who he is and what he wants, who his friends
are, and who loves him, in this autobiographical tale set in middle
America in the 1980s. Growing up, learning about life, love, sex,
friends, and lovers. |
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Latter Days
[2003] Aaron Davis (Steve Sandvoss) and
Christian Markelli (Wes Ramsey) are the two most opposite people in
the world. Aaron is a young Elder (or a Mormon missionary) who wants
to do his family proud and is quite passionate about his religion
and film. Christian is a shallow WeHo waiter/party boy who only
looks forward to bedding a new guy every night. After Aaron and
three other missionaries move into the apartment across from
Christian, his friends bet him $50 that he can't get one of them to
jump into the sack, so he instantly latches onto Aaron. There are
two problems, though - Christian is falling in love with Aaron and
the Mormons are not the biggest fans of the homosexual community.
Once Aaron is discovered, the two have to go through trials of
regret, loss, perseverance, and forgiveness if they both want to get
to the thing that matters to them most: each other. |
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24th Day
[2004]
Tom (Speedman) and Dan's (Marsden) one-night stand turns into an
intense power-play between captor and captive. |
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You'll Get Over It [2003]
When Vincent finds himself a victim of outing in his high school, he
must accept to live with the drastic changes it provokes, and
redefine his relationships with his friends and family. |
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