I usually try to at least skim reviews before starting these BL shows, just so I don't sink my time into a dud. I really should've listened to myself this time, because this series turned out to be eight hours I'll never get back. The premise had some genuine potential, but the acting and direction did absolutely nothing with it. Making it through all eight episodes, each roughly forty five minutes long, felt like work. A young man named Kim moves to an island city to live with his uncle. There's supposedly a reason for the move, but honestly, it barely matters. After arriving, he meets a chef named Tao Sor. When Kim sees him again the next day, something has changed: Tao Sor doesn't recognize him at all. We soon learn that the mysterious chef has a condition that erases his memory every morning, so someone has to repeatedly remind him who he is. Kim begins falling for Tao Sor and proposes a plan to the hotel where Tao Sor works: they can attract tourists by offering cooking experiences with the chef, helping bring more business to the hotel. They agree to it. Tao Sor may forget everything every morning, but he's also a gifted painter, and he keeps experiencing recurring visions of Kim that he paints. Those visions lead him to believe that the two of them share some deeper connection. Near the end, we discover that Tao Sor isn't actually related to the family he's been living with. Years earlier, the family lost their biological son. When…
This web series is another release from Last Leaf Productions on its YouTube channel. A handful of Indian channels have tried making BL content before, but honestly, the direction and acting in those projects were pretty rough. So I genuinely respect the effort this production house is making to bring us stories about gay relationships in India, especially ones set in a major city like Mumbai. For anyone unfamiliar with the term, a lavender marriage is a marriage between a gay man and a lesbian woman—or sometimes a straight woman—entered into purely to maintain appearances, with both people fully aware of what is really going on. That is the central premise of this show. There are 8 episodes, each running around 30-35 minutes. Apu and Mohak are roommates in Mumbai who have secretly been a couple for several years, keeping their relationship hidden. Apu's male cousin also lives with them and is, in fact, the owner of the flat. Mohak wants them to come out as a couple, but Apu isn't ready to take that step. Things become uncomfortable when the cousin makes gay jokes around them, and Apu eventually decides to tell him the truth about their relationship. It goes very badly. The following day, Apu receives a call informing him that his father has been hospitalized. His sister was meant to marry into another family in a match that would have finalized a business merger, but she ran away before the wedding. Now, to save face and protect his father's health, Apu's father pressures him to marry the…
It's been a while since Russell T Davies released a new show, so Tip Toe was pretty much guaranteed a spot near the top of my watch list. This feels very much like a show of the moment, rooted in the fear, anger, and hopelessness of being queer in the UK right now. One character says that he used to walk into a room going ta da, but now he tip toes just in case, and that basically captures the entire series. Across five episodes of about fifty minutes each, it mixes thriller elements with social drama to reflect the current reality of rising homophobia. Set in present day Manchester, the series places two neighbors with totally opposing worldviews side by side, then builds the story around the friction between them. The result is both a tense watch and a genuinely disturbing reflection of real life. Leo is nearly sixty, runs a local queer bar, and has recently separated from his longtime partner, leaving him to readjust to single life. Next door lives Clive and his wife, from whom he's now estranged after apparently cheating on her with another woman, their hot twenty five year old son Saul, who does webcam work for girls online, and their sixteen year old son George, who we eventually discover is secretly gay. After one of Leo's hookups goes badly, he finds himself locked out of his own home and forced to ask the neighbors for help. That's where the story really starts to turn. Clive offers him a spare key to use in…
This is exactly the sort of wildly over the top 90s gay comedy that you really can't treat seriously, and honestly, that's basically why it works at all. If you go in looking for a fun little watch, a couple of laughs, and a willingness to just roll with how ridiculous everything gets, that's the best way to take it, because beyond that there really isn't much happening. The plot is paper thin, and every performance is pushed so far past normal that it feels like some kind of spoof, even if I couldn't tell you what, specifically, it's supposed to be spoofing. The film is set in Mexico City in the nineties and follows Enrique, an up and coming telenovela star. He's about to score a major contract with a production company, until they find photos of him with his boyfriend and realize he's gay. His dad can't accept having a gay son and, because of that, can barely even talk to him. In order to save the contract, the head of the studio proposes that Enrique pretend to be romantically involved with a fading pop star who's trying to make a comeback, and who also happens to be secretly sleeping with the studio owner. Enrique and the singer both go along with the plan, which obviously drives Enrique's actual boyfriend crazy. Then Enrique gets into a sudden accident and loses his memory completely, with no idea who anyone is. His dad uses that opening to slide back into his life, showing him tabloid stories and videos to convince…
Honestly, I'm kind of shocked this stayed off my radar for so long because I'm only just hearing about it now. This crowdfunded comedy drama follows three gay best friends navigating life, love, and disappointment as they enter their late fifties and early sixties. What are you supposed to do when you realize time is running out, there's more road behind you than in front of you, and your career, relationship, home, and pretty much your entire life look nothing like what you imagined when you were young? There are eleven episodes, each running about ten minutes. A re-edited 5-episode Director's cut version was also released recently this year. Ray, Gary, and James have seemingly been friends forever, and they've now reached what should be their golden years. Ray is a financially struggling screenwriter because work simply isn't coming his way, although he does have a younger, attractive boyfriend who's a bit socially awkward. Gary, a singer and actor, has just learned that he has anal cancer. He's been relying heavily on alcohol to deal with it and can't bring himself to tell his friends what's happening. James, meanwhile, is an actor who can't get cast in anything, is enraged with his agent, and has a major chip on his shoulder. Through it all, the three depend on one another while repeatedly asking how and where their lives went wrong. With no savings, no homes of their own, and no retirement funds, they wonder how they're possibly meant to survive at this point. Everything changes when Ray's ex, who has…
The second season of this comedy about three middle aged gay friends juggling work and love has finally landed on their YouTube channel. There was a pretty sizable wait between seasons, but the story resumes exactly where it stopped—and somehow the entire cast looks precisely the same, without a single visible change, which is honestly kind of wild. Season one skipped ahead a year and left us with the knowledge that Ray and Dwight were no longer together. This time around, the focus stays on Ray, Gary, and James as they navigate career problems, complicated romantic lives, and the question of what their futures are supposed to look like now that they're getting older. There are 8 episodes this season, each about 25 minutes long. Ray still hasn't gotten past his breakup with Dwight, and then he picks up a writing job on a girls' animated show, where he has to work out how he belongs in a room packed with much younger GenZ writers. He can't seem to release his grip on Dwight, and it's obvious that keeping hold of the past is stopping him from moving on. Gary, meanwhile, gets a co-host position on a talk show and begins preparing to film the pilot. Around the same time, he's hit with the news that he has a son from years ago, which means he suddenly becomes both a father and an unexpected future grandfather. That's a lot to absorb at once, but with the career opportunity and the family revelation happening together, it winds up being a genuinely…
Using oral histories, this documentary explores a very particular chapter of New York gay life in America. In 2014, a box packed with hundreds of letters was discovered in an LA storage unit. The letters, dating back to the 1950s, were addressed to a young man named Reno Martin, who would later become Hollywood agent Ed Limato. After Martin left home to pursue a career in radio, his closest gay and queer friends continued writing to him simply to keep in contact. Each letter is signed under a fake name and closes with a request to burn it once it's been read, which says everything about a time when being gay—or appearing in drag—could land you in jail. The filmmakers managed to find the surviving writers, now in their eighties and nineties, turning what could have been dry historical research into something deeply personal and intimate. The filmmakers tracked down the original letter writers, several of whom are still alive, and had them speak openly about what it meant to live on the margins in those days. They've also assembled amazing archival photos and footage, bringing back the drag pageants and smoke-filled backrooms that once acted as a home base for the LGBTQ community, all under the constant weight of fear and oppression. At the time, you could legally be fired, beaten up, or worse simply for being gay. Closeted people who wrote love letters or anything that exposed their sexuality would nearly always tell the recipient to destroy them afterward, terrified they could end up in the wrong hands.…
Review of Arthur J. Bressan Jr.’s film Juice, which follows a gay photographer who must find new models for a magazine. Light and sexy. With this feature film, Arthur J. Bressan Jr. delivers a lighter, more modest work, immersing us in the daily life of Jim, an adult gay magazine photographer (Michael Christopher, very well endowed by nature)…
Sadly, this series falls into the same trap most GMM shows do. I really wanted it to be good because the premise genuinely had potential. And honestly, it starts out strong: playful, funny, with a fun little love-scam angle running through it. But around episode four or five, it slips back into the same worn-out formula every other show like this uses, leaving very little that sticks with you. There are twelve episodes, each roughly fifty five to sixty minutes long, so it demands a serious time commitment, yet it never offers enough charm to make all that feel worthwhile. The story centers on cousins Pai and North, both heirs to a rich, influential family. Pai is doing well in business, while North keeps wasting family money on ventures that fail. We first meet Tim, whose random encounter with Pai gradually turns into a slow-burn romance. But it is revealed pretty quickly that Tim had been after Pai from the beginning, intending to make him fall in love so he could secure a comfortable life with a wealthy man, while secretly also dating several rich women on the side. At roughly the same time, North meets U during a hiking trip and immediately falls for him. This comes right after North's breakup, and in a moment of impulsiveness, he proposes to U right there, even offering him money to agree. Since U is broke, he accepts the money and marries North, only learning afterward just how wealthy North's family really is. Eventually, U and Tim uncover one another's scams and…
This coming-of-age movie follows two teenage guys who seem completely opposite on paper, even though they’re both carrying baggage from their past. We get to watch them deal with it and fall for each other along the way. It starts off feeling like a teen rom-com, then becomes something much more personal by the end. Not gonna lie, I have no idea why they chose the English title they did, because the original title translates as Fifteen Days, and that fits so much better. Apparently it’s based on a book, and honestly, what makes it work is how straightforward it remains throughout. It has this warm, sunny vibe, and it’s not only about two boys falling in love. It’s really about learning to quit hiding after spending years trying not to be seen. Felipe is sixteen and has been insecure about his weight for years because other kids gave him hell about it growing up. He’s openly gay and lives with his mom, who’s a major presence in his life. When summer comes around, he’d honestly rather sit inside binge-watching things and reading manga than head outdoors to swim. Then Caio, his neighbor and the guy Felipe’s had a crush on since childhood, winds up staying at their house for two weeks while his parents are gone. Like that isn’t awkward enough already, Felipe realizes that he and Caio haven’t even talked in years. They drifted apart, and Felipe has convinced himself that Caio is one of those straight jock guys who could never be interested in someone like him.…
How can there be such a dearth of stories that these vertical filmmakers keep recycling the same 5-6 story permutations and combinations, just mixing and matching them? It’s like some old fantasies are being brought to life in these formats. I’m really starting to lose it completely. Then you read all these random, glowing, made-up reviews online and wonder whether people are even watching the same thing I am.Liam and Noah are stepbrothers, though not many people know it. Noah’s girlfriend actually likes Liam and tries to seduce him. Meanwhile, Liam has secretly been crushing on his stepbrother Noah. Since Liam can’t have Noah, he suggests that maybe the girl should ask Noah for a threesome. That’s when a drunk Noah shows up, against his better judgment, and the two finally kiss. Noah is now confused too—whether he is gay and how he can be attracted to his stepbrother. The story moves slowly, with the two men gradually realizing each other’s good points and falling in love. Of course, the evil girlfriend tries to ruin everything by exposing their secret and threatening to get them out of the hockey team, but her plans fall flat. In the end, they get love and acceptance from everyone.This BL was good for the emotional pull of showing Liam always wanting Noah while Noah remains unsure about his feelings. There isn’t as much drama and evilness as you see in some of the other vertical gay shows. The two boys were quite good-looking, and Noah’s nerdy look was pretty hot. But Liam is the…
Review of Romas Zabaraukas’s film Standing Tall (The Activist), which immerses us in a film noir-flavoured investigation set against the backdrop of LGBT rights. A political thriller at the heart of LGBT struggles in Lithuania, the film sees Lithuanian director Romas Zabaraukas return after winning us over with the referential, political cinema tinged with homoeroticism of his feature film Falling for Ali. He is back with a story that is even more committed—and rich in nuance…
