lgbt – Page 4 – PopCult Reviews

Movie Review – Angels in America

Angels in America (2003)
Written by Tony Kushner
Directed by Mike Nichols

Theater & queerness have always gone together. With my American Theater on Film series wrapping up to make room for our Pride film run coming in June, this is a perfect transition. Airing as a mini-series on HBO in 2003, Angels in America was based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning play of the same name. It’s a story primarily about being a gay man amid the rise of Ronald Reagan & the Christian conservative movement, all while AIDS is ravaging the LGBTQ community. It’s an epic play, premiering in parts with Part I debuting in 1991, followed by Part II in 1992. Altogether it’s six hours which is quite bold for a theater piece. Yet, the AIDS crisis was deserving of such a dense, heavy piece. How could it not be?

PopCult Podcast – Close/Saint Omer

Europe is producing some fantastic films these days and today we spotlight two of them. In one film, a young boy finds his friendship with another boy questioned by their peers leading to a fatal outcome. In the other, a writer attends the court trial of a woman accused of infanticide and in turn discovers truths about her own relationship with her mother.

PopCult Podcast – Ali: Fear That Eats the Soul/Far From Heaven

Douglas Sirk’s All That Heaven Allows wasn’t considered exceptional at the time of its release but successive generations of filmmakers certainly knew what a fantastic picture it was.

PopCult Podcast – Quadrophenia/Velvet Goldmine

Brits & music, two things that go together surprisingly well.

PopCult Podcast – The House/Safe

Two unsettling films. One is a stop motion anthology centered around the same house and the horrors that await its occupants. The other is dread-filled exploration of the way modern life sickens us.

PopCult Podcast – Alcarràs/Poison

A family comes to terms that they are losing the land they have farmed for two generations. A queer director expresses his frustration in three fragmented narratives.

TV Review – Work in Progress Season 1

Work in Progress Season 1 (Showtime)
Written by Abby McEnany & Tim Mason & Lilly Wachowski
Directed by Tim Mason

Work in Progress is a show that is made with love and thought. At first glance, someone might assume it is the queer response to Curb Your Enthusiasm, but it isn’t.

Abby McEnany brings to us on screen a heavy, queer representation onto television that is much needed. Abby writes alongside her writing partner Tim Mason, and she stares in it too.

My Favorite LGBTQ+ Movies

Dog Day Afternoon (1975, directed by Sidney Lumet)

Many people don’t think of this bank robbery film as LGBTQ if they are only familiar with from a pop culture reference standpoint. The main character, Sonny Wortzik (Al Pacino) is robbing the bank to get money for his lover, a transwoman, enough to pay for her transition surgery. This is a significant plot point in the second act, and I love how Lumet never tries to play the reveal for laughs. It’s accepted by everyone as just part of what is going down. This film is also a great anti-cop moving showing them as not all that intelligent, disorganized, and ultimately cruel. The classic scene where Pacino shouts “Attica!” refers to a prison rebellion from a few years prior, which ended with 33 inmates and 10 guards killed when the governor ordered state police to violently take back the facility.

Movie Review – Desert Hearts

Desert Hearts (1985)
Written by Natalie Cooper
Directed by Donna Deitch

It wasn’t too long ago that even in what is considered the “liberal bastion of Hollywood,” being out of the closet or even depicting a loving gay relationship was taboo. LGBTQ characters were relegated to supporting roles or, in sadly too many cases villains. Lesbian parts were often either psychologically manipulative of straight women or tragically destined to be alone or kill themselves. If you were an LGBTQ teen, there weren’t many positive media representations to help you get through adolescence and understand what romantic love looked like for someone like you. Director Donna Deitch set out to find a story that featured a lesbian romance outside of the urban and bohemian. She wanted a Middle America to help showcase how normal it was to everyone.

Movie Review – A Fantastic Woman

A Fantastic Woman (2017)
Written by Sebastián Lelio & Gonzalo Maza
Directed by Sebastián Lelio

Grief is universal, an emotion while experienced as a result of certain life events; it has a profound resonance in our lives. You never feel grief is moderation; it cascades over you like waves leading you to feel as though grief may take you under. Being trans is not an experience we will all have; in fact, it’s estimated about 0.6% of the population is transgender. Trans people feel grief just like anyone else; they love and feel loss no different than any human being. A Fantastic Woman puts its protagonist in a universally-experienced situation, never ignoring what role her gender plays in the story, as a means to connect her to the very people in the film that seeks to undermine her grieving process.