LGBTQ+ cinema has come a long way since the days when straight or closeted actors would regularly get asked in interviews how it felt to kiss a man: these days, LGBTQ+ performers from Ben Whishaw to Ian McKellen, via Elliot Page, Kristen Stewart or Colman Domingo, are almost routine presences in film – and with nothing to hide from their audiences. Hell, even Jodie Foster acknowledges her sexuality these days, after decades of it being the worst-kept secret in Hollywood.
That was far from the case in classic Hollywood – and even now the studios are resistant to change. But queer people have always contributed significantly to cinema, from directors (Eisenstein, Murnau, Cukor, Visconti, or the pioneering Dorothy Arzner) to performers (Marlene Dietrich, Montgomery Clift, Marlon Brando). Queer cinema doesn’t only encompass films with openly LGTBQ+ subject matter, made by openly queer people – and thank god. Our presence is also there, throughout, in innuendo, subversion, costuming, set decoration, and vision. Brando wearing a skin-tight T-shirt in A Streetcar Named Desire: that’s LGBTQ+ cinema. Judy Garland singing The Man That Got Away in A Star Is Born: that’s LGBTQ+ cinema.
And yet, on the fringes of the mainstream, openly queer film-makers did eventually break through and start filming alternative sexualities and identities upfront, for the benefit of a newly open queer culture. Pioneers such as Kenneth Anger, Chantal Akerman, John Waters, Rainier Werner Fassbinder and Derek Jarman paved the way for new generations of avowedly queer film-makers.
The following selection of LGBTQ+ films, all available to stream on BFI Player, takes us through several decades of queer films to the present day – a still embattled time for queer and trans people, alongside (paradoxically) a greater mainstream acceptance than ever. As the BFI prepares to celebrate the 40th anniversary of BFI Flare: London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival, these queer films remind us of an alternative view of society, one that looks on from the outside, which rebels and revels, and stands tall and proud.
Je, tu, il, elle (Chantal Akerman, 1974)
A year before Jeanne Dielman, the masterpiece that was recently voted the greatest film of all time in Sight and Sound’s 2022 poll of international critics, Chantal Akerman made Je, tu, il, elle. At only 24, the director films herself as Julie, the protagonist of the film, who at the outset of the story lives alone in her apartment, listlessly wandering around in various stages of undress. From there, she hitchhikes with and masturbates a married lorry driver, and then has a sexual encounter with a former lover. Akerman’s film is queer not just in its long lesbian sex scene, but in Akerman’s very demeanour, her subversion of gender and the domestic, and her radical formal freedom.
Young Soul Rebels (Isaac Julien, 1991)
Isaac Julien’s debut feature, released in 1991 and centring on the friendship between two young Black men in late 1970s London, is a time capsule of urban life around the time of the Queen’s Silver Jubilee. The force of Julien’s film is in situating a gay interracial romance within this integrated community, with all of its subcultures represented beautifully. Young Soul Rebels discusses homophobia and racism, but in every scene of this stylish film Julien has a surprising lightness of touch. Bonus: a gay sex scene featuring a prominent loo roll.
Sebastiane (Derek Jarman, 1976)
Jarman’s debut, a weird and free fantasia about the martyrdom of Saint Sebastian, for years a figure held to be an LGBTQ+ icon, mines a fascination with the erotic nature of suffering. The extremely game and appealing Leonardo Treviglio, never wearing anything more than a thong (costumes appear to take a few liberties with historical accuracy), plays Sebastian, whose beauty and devoutness infuriate and bewitch the leader of the Roman garrison in which he is made to serve. A BDSM-tinged dynamic ensues. Performed entirely in Latin and replete with cheerful nudity, Sebastiane is a scrappy, inexpensive affair that has a bit of fun with the Christian legend.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Céline Sciamma, 2019)
Celine Sciamma’s ravishing period drama centres on the doomed love affair between a young woman, Héloïse (Adèle Haenel) and an artist, Marianne (Noémie Merlant). Héloïse is soon to be married to a nobleman, and Marianne has been commissioned to paint her portrait for the occasion, but must study her in secret as the young woman is averse to being painted. Portrait of a Lady on Fire glows like an ember to begin with, before becoming aflame with the rapturous affair between the two women. Mythology, art and identity intertwine for a powerful reflection on love. Watch out for a magnificent final scene showing the influence of Call Me By Your Name.
Pink Narcissus (James Bidgood, 1971)
Pink Narcissus is basically upmarket softcore porn – an artform like any other, thank you very much. Essentially a lush reverie focusing on a young hustler as he daydreams himself into various erotic scenarios, the movie presents a deeply queer vision of sex, full of fantasy and playfulness. A matador with a stonking erection, a belly dancer draped in pearl necklaces, bikers in their leather: Bidgood films all this in a lush, camp style full of outrageous colours that would influence the artists Pierre et Gilles.
Power Alley (Lillah Halla, 2023)
Amid all the supposed “debates” about trans inclusion in sport, Lillah Halla’s intelligent and touching Power Alley presents a refreshingly open view of a gender-fluid volleyball team, in which a star player, Sofia, is about to play the match of her life. But Sofia is also pregnant, and seeks an abortion at a time when this procedure is criminalised in Brazil. As played by Ayomi Domenica Dias, Sofia is a determined and richly delineated character, certain in her sexuality and her decisions; her teammates’ unflinching solidarity forms a moral backbone against the hatred and oppressions of society.
Querelle (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1982)
Querelle is an oddity, a weirdly artificial and stagey affair based on a story by Jean Genet. Brad Davis, gussied up in an outfit as tight as seems physically possible, plays the titular character, a sailor undergoing a sexual awakening. Jeanne Moreau plays a highly camp madam, forever crooning a bar song that quotes Oscar Wilde, and Querelle gets himself into some suitably rough sexual situations. Everything here is louche and seedy, and Davis is a sight for sore eyes.
The Ornithologist (João Pedro Rodrigues, 2016)
The decorative Paul Hamy features as Fernando, the titular bird-fancier (no, not like that), in this mysterious curio from Portuguese director João Pedro Rodrigues. As the film starts, Fernando is on a field trip to study black storks, kayaking along a wide and beautiful river. But a series of strange events befall him, paralleling the life of St Anthony of Padua – and why not? Along the way, Fernando finds himself trussed up bondage-style on the shore and frolicking with somebody called Jesus. Blasphemous, bold, beguiling, The Ornithologist is a rich and poetic modern parable.
Benediction (Terence Davies, 2021)
A last hurrah for legendary queer director Terence Davies sees him focus with his typically melancholy, deeply poetic perspective on the wartime poet Siegfried Sassoon. Davies is a queer pioneer in his work on memory, community, art and literature, and here once again he seems to find the real heart of the figure at the centre of his film, played soulfully by Jack Lowden as the young man and Peter Capaldi in his later years. Benediction is opulent and eminently tasteful in its aesthetic, but as always with Davies a quiet fire rages within the strictures of society.
Beach Rats (Eliza Hittman, 2017)
Harris Dickinson’s brilliant performance as a closeted teenager in Brooklyn is one of the great screen debuts. Beach Rats depicts, with great confidence and a real feel for detail, the conflicted feelings of Frankie, a young man who hangs out with his hyper-macho pals at Coney Island in the day, and trawls hook-up sites for men by night. Dickinson, in a revelatory turn, teases out all the tension and vulnerability in his outwardly blunt, surly character. The film makes for a fine, committed psycho-social investigation.
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