gay movie recs?

[kindkit]

Tonight I have been gravely disappointed by the two gay-themed movies I rented with my roommate. I'd seen Forgive and Forget before, but I'd forgotten the ending was so utterly grim, making gayness look like a guarantee of loveless isolation and coming out look like the worst mistake a person can make.


Regular Guys (Echte Kerle) started out funny and enjoyable, but it ended with a tedious reiteration of the main character's heterosexuality that negated the emotional bond, not to mention the sexual tension, he'd developed with another man. The film also tried to pull a happy ending out of a hat by having another character come out as gay (and claim to be the rejected gay guy's new boyfriend) in the last two minutes. What is this emotional coherence you speak of?


Why is it so damn difficult to find gay movies that (a) end happily, (b) don't end in Surprise Heterosexuality, (c) are well-written and well-acted?

Anybody have recs for gay (male) non-documentary movies that meet those criteria? I have a horrible feeling I've already seen all the ones that exist. Films I have seen include: The Adventures of Felix, The Adventures of Priscilla Queen of the Desert (the gay characters are tangential, as I recall, with the focus on the straight trans woman), Beautiful Thing, Big Eden, Edge of Seventeen, Get Real (not actually very happy anyway), Jeffrey, Like It Is, Maurice, My Beautiful Laundrette, The Sum of Us, and Wild Reeds (also not very happy). [ETA: also The Wedding Banquet.]

Your help is appreciated.

Comments

[svollga]

I have the same problem, and though I have a huge collection of gay-themed movies, I haven't seen a lot of them because I checked the plot via Wikipedia and know that the ending is not happy. (And I'm rarely in the mood for not happy.)

Things I can recommend:
4 movies about Donald Strachey (Third Man Out, Shock to the System, Ice Blues, On the Other Hand Death) - mysteries about a gay private investigator who is open in his sexuality and happily partnered. (I also recommend the books these are based on.)
Friends and Family - gay comedy for straights, full of stereotypes, but rare because it shows a happy stable gay couple and centers on entirely different issues than their sexuality.
Latter Days
Gone But Not Forgotten - a typical love story with amnesia as a plot point.
Imagine Me and You (lesbian)
To Wong Foo With Love - US adaptation of Priscilla that differs a lot from the original into the 'mundane fairy tale' realm, but I still like it (and Patrick Swayze looks gorgeous in dress). Though characters are almost devoid of their sexuality through the story, there are some lines that imply heavily that they are gay.

Movies that are not very happy (or very not happy) but still left me with a good feeling or a feeling that the story was good but sad:
Love and Human Remains
Urbania

I usually add the original (British) version of Queer as Folk to the list of movies because it feels like a movie to me, not the soap opera of the US version.

[ten]

Adding my voice to the Strachey recs. I've only seen two movies (Third Man Out and Shock To The System), but I really liked how homosexuality, while certainly a strong topic, is not treated as the Source Of Tragedy nor Something Exotic. (Strachey has a somewhat tragic backstory because of his homosexuality, but it's a rather realistic one, and he is shown to be able to deal with the emotional damage it left in him with the help of his husband/partner in the end.)

[svollga]

This! They are stories about gays without being about Teh Gays.
I find two latter movies a tad weaker than the former two, but they are still good. And I like how they rework the storylines from the books (set in 80s and 90s) into 00s reality.

[kindkit]

Thanks! I've seen some of these (Gone But Not Forgotten, which I'm afraid I didn't care for, and Urbania), but there are a number that I haven't.

And I am in total agreement with your later comment about wanting "stories about gays without being about Teh Gays." I'm not really all that into the established genres of Gay Movies (e.g. the coming-out story, the indie rom-com, the AIDS tragedy) and I wish there were more films that just featured gay characters and same-sex relationships centrally and normally within the context of bigger stories. One of the few films I can think of that does this is My Beautiful Laundrette, and what a sad commentary it is that MBL was made in 1982 and there's been little like it since.

[mumblemutter]

Here via the network, have you seen Shelter? It's... somewhat heavy-handed at times, but it certainly ends happy and it's also really pretty. Everything else I could think of has been mentioned already. There's really not a ton, is there.

[kindkit]

You're the second person to rec Shelter to me (the other was on LJ) so I'll definitely check it out. Thanks!

[svollga]

Also, I Love You Phillip Morris is very good and left me with an impression of a happy ending.
A Single Man is good but I prefer to cut away the last two minutes and watch it as a movie with a happy ending, and not another Dead Gay story.

[kindkit]

I Love You, Philip Morris has still not been released in the US. Supposedly it's due to appear in October 2010, but it's been delayed and delayed (and I vaguely remember hearing that it was re-edited to remove some of the gay) so I'm not hopeful.

I haven't been able to bring myself to watch A Single Man yet because I know it's sad. One of these days, I guess. But I have a hard time getting myself in the mood to watch a depressing gay movie.

[sineala]

A Touch of Pink! Nerdy classic-film geek gets help wooing the cute boy from his imaginary friend Cary Grant. It is very very very cute, and happy, and they are still gay at the end.

Seconding the Strachey movies (though they are not, IMO, as fun as the books), Trick, and Shelter. Dante's Cove (and its spinoff the Lair) are very very very gay and definitely queer-affirming, but also very bad, but bad in the way where it's kind of hilarious to keep watching.

...maybe Velvet Goldmine? Everybody likes Velvet Goldmine, right? Okay, the ending is kind of sad. But there are glitter aliens.

[kindkit]

Thanks! A Touch of Pink sounds awesome, and several others have recommended Shelter to me.

[very_improbable]

I think Parting Glances ends well. It's been a while since I saw it, though.

[very_improbable]

I'm also fond of In & Out, if you haven't seen it already. Oh, and Trick is pretty adorable.

There, I've recced one from each of the last three decades. :) Any earlier than that and they get thin on the ground. Unless you count Some Like It Hot as a gay movie on the strength of its final line...

[kindkit]

I'm afraid I've seen both In and Out and Parting Glances; I'll give Trick a try, though, despite being somewhat allergic to rom-coms.

Some Like It Hot should count as a gay movie! *hugs it*

[senmut]

I've got nothing to offer, sadly. My favorite gay movie is probably one of the saddest movies I ever watched.

[kindkit]

Which one is that?

[senmut]

It's My Party with Eric Roberts. Granted, it's been years (13? I think) since I saw it, but it hit hard inside my soul for its theme.

Jeffrey is another, lighter one, but I think someone mentioned it already. And none of the ones on My List have been evaluated since I was introduced to a broader sampling of how to evaluate media as fair and properly representing the cultures within it.