BFI Flare

Film Skool

| Discover the best new queer cinema from around the world at #BFIFlare: London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival 18-29 March at BFI Southbank.

Explore the line-up now and book tickets from 26 February.

BFI Flare 2023

FILM SKOOL

See the best new queer films and immersive storytelling from around the world at BFI Flare 2023, taking place 15-26 March at BFI Southbank and on BFI Player.

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FEVER

Film

Skool

After escaping Jay's racist family to start afresh, Jay (Jeremy Feight) and Andre (David J. Cork) stop at Andre's Mother's birthday party. There, Jay's mental health unravels as he unearths the dangers of his privilege in their interracial relationship.

FEVER, a film by Angele Cooper.

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Sublime

Film

Skool

16-year-olds Manuel and Felipe live in a coastal town in Argentina. They have known each other their whole lives and do everything together. They’re best friends at school, around town and in their noisy rock band. Like most adolescents they spend a lot of time thinking about, and planning, how to get laid. Felipe is helping Manuel convert an old van into a secret love nest to entertain their respective girlfriends and they’re working hard in rehearsal for their concert debut. Felipe discovers a talent for songwriting, with lyrics evoking thwarted desire. But he’s also struggling with his emotions.

Things come to a head in the days before the concert and suddenly everything is at stake: friendship, love, and the band.

Sublime, a film by Mariano Biasin.

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Tomorrow Then

Film

Skool

When a lover returns from a holiday in Amsterdam, his reunion with his boyfriend is a little strained.

Tomorrow Then, a film by David Moragas.

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Jump, Darling

Film

Skool

A rookie drag queen reeling from a breakup escapes to the country, where he finds his grandmother (Cloris Leachman) in steep decline yet desperate to avoid the local nursing home.

Jump, Darling, a film by Phil Connell.

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Cured

FILM SKOOL

Cured takes viewers inside the campaign that led to a pivotal yet largely unknown moment in the struggle for LGBT equality: the American Psychiatric Association's 1973 decision to remove homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses.

Combining eyewitness testimony with newly unearthed archival footage, the film reveals how a small group of impassioned activists achieved this unexpected victory.

Cured, a film by Patrick Sammon and Bennett Singer.

Find more film previews and reviews, at KAOS.

Men of Hard Skin

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F I L M  S K O O L

A   F I L M   I S   A   P E T R I F I E D   F O U N T A I N   O F   T H O U G H T

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Teenager Ariel lives a seemingly quiet life with his father and sister on their picturesque farm in a rural part of Buenos Aires. However, unbeknownst to his family, Ariel has been abused for years by Omar, his neighbourhood priest. Having confused his mistreatment for romantic affection, Ariel takes it upon himself to free himself from their relationship and soon embarks on a secret affair with one of the male workers on his father’s property. Meanwhile, as Omar continues to succumb to his urges, he forms a friendship with a much older priest who finds himself wrestling with similar desires.   BFI

In its coverage of issues of ecclesiastical abuse and rural isolation, José Celestino Campusano's film is undoubtedly important, but it's also frustratingly unfocused and meandering.

Ariel (Wall Javier) is an attractive and engaging protagonist - not merely a cowed victim, but full of vim and vigour, even in the face of the grimmest of circumstances. The rural Argentine location is interesting, and there are tantalising strands of story here, but it all feels lost in the mix.

Men of Hard Skin is a fair try, but it lacks the urgency of, say, Socrates. Despite its failings, it's still worth a watch.

Socrates

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I T ' S  N O T  W H A T  A  M O V I E  I S  A B O U T ,  I T ' S  H O W  I T  I S  A B O UT  I T

A Brazilian social-realist drama from Independent Spirit Someone to Watch award-winning director Alexandre Moratto. Christian Malheiros, Tales Ordakji, and Caio Martinez Pacheco star in Socrates.

After his mother's sudden death, Socrates, a 15-year-old living on the margins of São Paulo's coast, must survive on his own. As he faces isolation because of his sexuality, his search for a decent, worthy life reaches a breaking point. Produced by Ramin Bahrani (99 Homes), Socrates is the debut feature film from 29-year-old Brazilian-American filmmaker Alexandre Moratto. It is the first feature produced by the Querô Institute in Brazil where it was co-written, produced, and acted by at-risk teenagers from local low-income communities, with the support of UNICEF.

Read the KAOS review here.

BFI Flare 2019: Giant Little Ones

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"For popular student Franky, home life is a bit more complicated than it is for most teenagers. Dealing with the repercussions of his father leaving his mother for another man, the breakdown of his seemingly perfect family has left him with a few emotional issues. School, on the other hand, is great. Not only does Franky have a loving girlfriend, he also has the support of his long-time best friend, the ever reliable Ballas. But Franky’s world is about to get turned upside down once again when an unexpected encounter at his 16th birthday party has some fateful consequences." BFI Flare

You'd think this was a genre that's been done to death: in recent years we've had mainstream hits like Love, Simon and Alex Strangelove, and accomplished indie hits like Akron. Can there be anything new to say about photogenic teens on the verge of coming out?

Yes. Giant Little Ones starts out like its older bros, but, thanks to a really smart, satisfying twist (no spoilers here), becomes something else.

Franky (Josh Wiggins) is utterly charming as the genial Franky. An Abercrombie & Fitch-beautiful Darren Mann is his best friend, Ballas. Kyle MacLachlan also stars, as Franky's suddenly gay father, but its the scene-stealing Niamh Wilson who you'll most likely remember, as Franky's unapologetically queer friend, Mouse. There's an outrageously funny scene in which the strap-on wearing lesbian demands some hands on experience of her buddy's equipment. Wiggins and Wilson are hysterical.

Perfectly pitched and cast, Giant Little Ones even has a bittersweet, lump-in-the-throat ending.

A future classic.

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BFI Flare 2019: Socrates

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"After his mother’s sudden death, 15-year-old Socrates must learn how to fend for himself in São Paulo. Unable to collect her ashes without the consent of a legal guardian and with no income to cover the rent for his run-down apartment, Socrates sees no way out. Landing a small construction job, he meets a troubled young man with whom he forms an unlikely connection. But as financial pressures mount, so do Socrates’ burgeoning feelings, leading him to confront the harsh reality of his situation." BFI Flare

Before you watch Socrates, stock up with tissues. This trip to São Paulo is going to be traumatic.

Socrates is a product of the Querô Institute in Brazil, a UNICEF-supported non-profit that provides social inclusion to teenagers from low-income communities through film-making. Incredibly, the film was co-written, produced and acted by these kids. Watching this accomplished production, you'd never know.

It's this input that gives Socrates its rawness. It's hard to watch Socrates, compellingly played by Christian Malheiros, suffer first bereavement, then heartbreak, isolation and poverty. At his lowest ebb, Socrates cries. He sobs uncontrollably, in deeply troubling, visceral scenes of real trauma. Socrates forces us to watch, from the safety of our comfortable cinema seats, the horrifying choices this gay child is forced to make - and question our own complicity.

A real triumph for its young cast and crew, Socrates will stay with you for a long time afterwards - as it ought to.

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BFI Flare 2019: Consequences

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"17-year-old delinquent Andrej has a serious chip on his shoulder. When his antisocial behaviour lands him in a youth correctional facility, he quickly falls in with a bad crowd, led by volatile and unpredictable Željko. As the two inmates form a tentative friendship, Andrej senses a strong physical attraction blossoming. But are Željko’s feelings real, or is he just using Andrej as a pawn in a far more dangerous game? Driven by a commanding performance from rising star Matej Zemljič, who imbues the conflicted Andrej with a palpable sense of silent longing, Darko Štante’s bracingly homoerotic drama resists the familiar traits we might expect from a queer teen narrative, in favour of something more distinctive and seductive." BFI Flare

Consequences is the first gay-themed film to emerge from Slovenia, a country best known for inflicting Melania Trump on the world. It's also the first feature from director Darko Štante.

Many of gay cinema's most recognisable ingredients are in play here: the errant youth (Andrej, played by Matej Zemljic); the mother from hell; the brutal yet homoertoic institution; some violent, antagonistic yobs... Instead of merely using these tropes to tell a familiar story, but set in Slovenia, Darko cleverly subverts expectations, elevating Consequences from being a solid feature, to a genuinely surprising one.

There's a couple of really shocking, didn't-see-it-coming moments, that will go into my own list of gay cinema's sexiest moments, but where Consequences really succeeds is in its examination of toxic masculinity and the complex dynamics between Andrej and the manipulative Željko.

Challenging, startling and uncompromising, Consequences is a winner.

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BFI Flare 2019: Labyrinths of Desire

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"Films about finding a connection, whether in the street, a bath-house, nightclub or on an app." BFI Flare

Festival veteran Brian Robinson curates shorts program Labyrinths of Desire. So what's a hit, and what's a miss?

Darío (director: Manuel Kinzer) is first up. The titular Darío, a dreamy 17-year-old lives in Barranquilla, Colombia, with his harridan of a mother. He's living for his carnival dance group, so much so that the attentions of an even dreamier admirer go unheeded. Kinzer's film is an absolute joy, and you'll be sure to fall in love with Darío. I did.

We're off to Taiwan next for Gentleman Spa (director: Yu Jhi Han).

Hao has self esteem issues. He also works in a gay bath house with sexy massuers. "Not many films feature fat people the protagonist," Yu Jhi Han says, "and even fewer gay films do. I'd like to make a film about ordinary people, like you and I, experiencing the pangs and trepidations of love."

Hao-Zhe Lai's character (also named Hao) is a lovable loser, and the focus on body positivity is timely.

My Loneliness Is Killing Me (director: Tim Courtney) is the highlight of this collection. "[It's] a film that will relate to anyone who shares the fear of living or dying without human connection and intimacy," Courtney says. Luke Elliott is fabulous as Elliott,  a sort of English Noah grappling with effeminophobia. There's a satisfying sting in its tale, too: wait for the end.

Enter (directors: Manuel Billi and Benjamin Bodi) probably ensured a sell-out house with its trailer, which hints at a mass of naked, writhing bodies.

Despite abundant sex, it manages to be moribund and a trial of patience. If you enjoy protracted conversations with someone who's smashed out of their head on drugs, yet believes they're being deeply profound, this is for you.

Foreign Lovers (director: Timothy Ryan Hickernell) wraps things up (and compensates for Enter's pretensions).

Foreign Lovers interrogates the notion of love at first sight. "I was coming off a career enhancing experience and then was suddenly unemployed, un-inspired, and spending most of my time in solitude," Hickernell says. "I was seeking affection from strangers on apps. The winter blues. When no one could see this dance show I had been dying to see I took myself out. A beautiful Italian dancer captured my attention during the performance. Serendipitously our paths crossed at a bar down the street just as I was leaving. A two day love affair ensued. Then and there I had been awoken. I knew I found my story."

Gloriously romantic, you'll swoon.

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BFI Flare 2019: Last Ferry

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"For Joseph, a young lawyer from Manhattan, his first excursion to Fire Island is far from what he had in mind. Looking for a good time, he finds the infamous island on its off-season, with nary a hot guy in sight. Things start to look up when he meets a handsome stranger, but Joseph’s luck goes from bad to worse when his furtive lover drugs and robs him. Drifting into unconsciousness, Joseph suddenly witnesses a murder. Waking to find himself in the care of a seemingly charitable local named Cameron, Joseph seems safe from harm. But as he should know by now, nothing is quite what it seems. Like Stranger by the Lake transposed to the luxurious locales of the fabled gay resort, this deliciously playful mystery will keep you guessing until the very end.." BFI Flare

There aren't really many gay thrillers out there: recently, M/M and Stranger By The Lake set pulses racing, whilst further back, Transfixed, American Translation, Our Paradise, and Eastern Boys were all effective nail biters.

Director Jaki Bradley's Last Ferry doesn't quite live up to its dark and disturbing precursor, Stranger By The Lake (writer and lead actor Ramon Torres specified the French thriller as a key inspiration in the post-screening Q&A), but it has a pretty good stab at it.

There's much to like about Last Ferry, including a fantastic soundtrack, and an excellent cast. Torres is perfect as lonely, insecure Joseph, and Sheldon Best excels as his gorgeous love interest, Cameron (and Best is very, very gorgeous). But props must go to Larry Owens for stealing every scene as that gay friend.

Things fall apart a little in the last act, which doesn't quite pay off the build-up, but the ride is so enjoyable that it doesn't really matter. You won't be inclined to holiday on Fire Island after this, but you'll probably be tempted back for another look at the Last Ferry, if only to gawp at Myles Clohessy's incredible ass.

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BFI Flare 2019: José

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"José is 19, lives in Guatemala with his mother and is employed to hustle customers at a roadside cafe. The grim realities of inner city life – the struggle to keep body and soul together, along with the perils of petty crime – might drag a lesser man down. But not optimistic and sexually promiscuous José. Then he meets Luis, a construction worker from out of town. The bond they immediately feel suggests to José that, finally, he might have met the one. Winner of the Queer Lion at the Venice Film Festival, this passionate and emotionally engaging story is an affecting tale of desire, but also of rebelling against societal conventions, macho attitudes and the strictures of religion. It’s also a rare portrait of gay life in contemporary Guatemala." BFI Flare

Over the past few years, some of the best features at BFI Flare have been from Latin America - Brazil's Hard Paint (BFI Flare 2018), Argentina's Marilyn (BFI Flare 2018), Brazil's Body Electric (BFI Flare 2017), Chile's Jesús (BFI Flare 2017), and going back to 2016, Venezuela's From Afar.

Add Guatemala's José to that list of winners.

Director Li Cheng interviewed gay and marginalised youth from across Latin America before deciding to set his film in Guatemala, where he felt the need for this story was most urgent. For those of us fortunate enough to live in relatively safe metropolises like London and San Francisco, the plight of gay men - particularly young gay men - in countries like Guatemala is almost unimaginable. Films like José bridge this gap.

Enrique Salanic, not a professional thesp, is a revelation as the titular José, his performance subdued, naturalistic. We stay with him, through the highs and lows, often in tight tracking shots, and at other times, spying our protagonist from afar, a lonely figure in the urban hellscape.

The film closes with an affecting scene at some Mayan ruins (Salanic himself is of Mayan descent), that will guarantee José a place in your heart.

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BFI Flare 2019: Jonathan Agassi Saved My Life

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"When a fresh-faced Jonathan Agassi hit the international gay porn scene in the late 2000s, he blew everyone else out of the water. Nothing short of a sensation, Agassi experienced a meteoric rise to fame, quickly becoming one of the most popular and prolific adult superstars in the business. Dividing his time between Berlin and Tel Aviv, Agassi supports his film career with live porn shows and escort work, making claims to have the best job in the world. But Agassi the performer and Agassi the person are two very different entities, and his euphoric professional highs are frequently countered by crushing personal lows. Bolstered by the unconditional support of his mother Anna, Agassi questions the nature of his fame and interrogates his self-destructive tendencies as he searches for a sense of happiness that continues to elude him. In his latest documentary, acclaimed filmmaker Tomer Heymann paints a fascinating portrait of a young man wrestling with loneliness, addiction and childhood traumas, and offers a probing, but never damning, insight into an industry that seems to promise so much." BFI Flare

The gay porn industry is not kind to its models. Even if you don't know about Joey Stefano, Erik Rhodes or Colin Black, or follow the gay porn gossip blogs, you already know this.

So we know, even before watching the trailer, that Jonathan Agassi's story won't be a happy one, and that the industry that has buoyed him, might also be his undoing, as it has been for so many others.

Or, is the opposite true, as the title of Tomer Heymann's film - Jonathan Agassi Saved My Life - suggests? Heymann leaves space for the audience to make up its own mind, but it's hard not to draw the conclusion that being a gay porn star is as demanding as it probably is corrosive.

Eight years in the making, the film covers the highs and lows in Agassi's life, both professional and personal. His mother is a hero, his father a devil. Russian pornographer Michael Lucas lives up to his sleazy reputation. And what of us, the audience? Is Jonathan Agassi Saved My Life further exploitation? Agassi has already given us his body; now, we get to pick over the bones of what's left.

Titillating, thought-provoking, and well-intentioned - but will it help its subject's well-being? Who knows. Maybe it'll save his life.

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BFI Flare 2018: God's Own Country

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"Johnny Saxby, a young, isolated Yorkshire farmer indulges in binge-drinking and casual sex to compensate for his everyday frustrations. But when a handsome Romanian worker is hired to help with the demands of lambing season, an unexpected relationship develops between the pair, leading Johnny to question the decisions he has made in his life."

God's Own Country is, like Call Me By Your Name, that other gay movie we're told is a must-see. It's the best, Jerry. The Best!

I don't know about you, but that kind of hype is a big turn off for me, for reasons I went into with my review of Call Me By Your Name. I've an inbuilt resistance to hype, and so, since I sit down in the theatre with grave misgivings, these films gain the unintended advantage of rock bottom expectations.

Media pre-approval aside, God's Own Country doesn't have a lot in common with its much-hyped sister. It is a story of sexual awakening, and coming of age in the countryside, but rough (albeit very good-looking) Yorkshire farmer Johnny (Josh O'Connor) is a world away from Name's privileged twink Elio. And you can't get further removed from Armie Hammer's smarmy American Oliver than Romanian immigrant Gheorghe (Alec Secareanu).

But, ee, it's grim up north! We do love a bit of misery in gay cinema, don't we? I was able to open my first three film festival reviews with exactly the same line: "for (insert protaganist's name) life in an (insert name of place) backwater ain't a lot of fun."

For Johnny, it's grimmer than it is for most. A bit too grim, in fact. Big Gay Picture Show reviewer Tim Issac is a former farm boy himself (settle down at the back) and feels they over egged the pudding a bit. But for me, Johnny's depressing Groundhog Day slog sells the transformation Gheorghe's arrival brings about.

With the wild landscape, raw romance, and that sex scene (surely destined to become iconic) there's been lazy comparisons with Brokeback Mountain. God's Own Country is much, much better than that, and the ending is a refreshing divergence from gay cinema's norm.

An intelligent, poignant film that lives up to the hype, whilst managing to surprise and delight.

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BFI Flare 2018: Call Me By Your Name

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"When Oliver (Armie Hammer) visits a family’s rural Italian villa over the course of one summer, young Elio (Oscar-nominated Timothée Chalamet) finds his life turned upside down. His father, an academic and archaeologist, has invited Oliver to help him with his research. The suave American easily fits into this world, becoming a fixture with the gamblers in the local cafe and making everyone fall in love with his effortless athletic enthusiasm. Meanwhile, Elio’s obsession with Oliver becomes overwhelming as the weeks go by. Dare he hope for more than friendship?"

Here's a confession: I didn't want to like Call Me By Your Name. I came to the screening with rock bottom expectations (despite having read, and enjoyed, André Aciman's novel of the same name), determined to be be proven right.

In part, this was down to ear ache from the incessant hype this film has generated since it was first mooted. The heterosexuality of the two leads (Armie Hammer and Timothée Chalamet) niggled me, too. Gay for pay doesn't necessarily make a rotten tomato, but it's never a bonus. And then there was the suspicion that this was the gay movie the mainstream gay media really wanted. You know, "Moonlight was all well and good, but that was about blacks. This movie's really about us... "

And, with its precocious, privileged protagonist on the continent, the reek of the sickeninly bourgeoisie Departure (my personal film bête noire) also haunted Call Me By Your Name.

And it was looking dicey for a while. Initially, Chalamet's Elio didn't endear himself to me, and Hammer just doesn't have the legs for the kind of shorts he parades around in. (Please dear, put them away. You ain't Simeon Panda.) But, gradually, their slow-burning romance won me over. The first hour is the calm before the storm; the storm speaks of unbridled teenage lust. I can just about remember that long ago, and if you've forgotten, Call Me By Your Name will remind you.

Special mention must go to Timothée Chalamet, who is sensational. Few of us, perhaps, have spent summer days lazing around the Lomardy countryside whilst mother reads to us from a 16th century romance, but most of us will have endured the wonderful, terrible tidal wave of hormones and feelings that hit Elio.

Just like that teen cocktail, Call Me By Your Name is a beautiful agony.

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