Category: Adolescence

Two former friends rekindle their affections in the romantic drama I Miss You When I See You

An old-fashioned gay romance from Simon Chung, the director behind End of Love and Speechless, I Miss You When I See You stars Hong Kong actors Jun Li and Ji-Lok Mak Bryant as Kevin and Jamie, former best friends from high school.

Their emotional attachment and growing love for one another were cut abruptly short by Kevin’s departure to Australia with his mother.

Twelve years later, Jamie tracks down Kevin in Australia. The reunion with his best friend reminds Kevin – suffering from depression – of his youthful ambitions. He decides to return to Hong Kong to be closer to Jamie.

Meanwhile, Jamie, who is in a steady relationship with his girlfriend, finds his feelings for Kevin reawakened and growing stronger.

Inevitably, both men must make a choice between society’s expectations… or following their hearts.

Watch the trailer for I Miss You When I See You below. The film is now available on Dekkoo.

Short Film Spotlight: Sparrow

Written and directed by Welby Ings, Sparrow is a visually inventive 15-minute short film from New Zealand which follows an unusual young boy who believes he can fly.

Adorned with a set of homemade wings, he finds himself a frequent target of bullying at school. When he discovers the truth behind a family myth involving his war veteran grandfather, he finally discovers the strength to stand up to his abusers.

Visually stunning and deeply moving, Sparrow earned acclaim and awards at countless film festivals all around the globe when it was originally released in 2016.

Welby Ings recently made his feature-length debut with a boxing drama called Punch, which has also been earning a great deal of buzz at festivals over the past year and is expected to be released in the US in 2023.

Watch the trailer for Sparrow below. The film is now available on Dekkoo.

Alan Cumming and Garrett Dillahunt star in the emotional period piece Any Day Now

From writer-director Travis Fine, Any Day Now is a fact-based drama starring Alan Cumming and Garrett Dillahunt. Set in the late-1970s, the film follows a gay couple who take in a child with down syndrome, played by Isaac Levya.

Once their new living arrangement is discovered by the local authorities, the men find that they must fight their way through an unjust and incredibly discriminatory legal system to adopt the child they have come to love as their own.

A deeply moving drama which takes a look at a difficult time in history, Any Day Now earned rave reviews from critics and won audience awards at over ten film festivals when it first made the rounds in 2012, including Tribeca where it premiered. Alan Cumming was also given Best Actor awards from Outfest, Seattle, Key West and Napa Valley film festivals.

Watch the trailer for Any Day Now below. The film is now available on Dekkoo.

Two bullies flirt with the wrong girl in the dark revenge comedy Groupers

Two homophobic high school bullies flirt with the wrong girl at a club in Groupers, a controversial new film from writer-director Anderson Cowan.

After picking up drunken teens Brad and Dylan (Peter Mayer-Klepchick and Cameron Duckett) in a bar, Meg (Nicole Dambro) drugs them and ties them up in an empty swimming pool at an abandoned house.

She selected them because they were inflicting homophobic terror on her gay little brother, who recently attempted suicide. Now she’s using them for her thesis project, an experiment to prove that sexuality is not a choice.

Thesis papers, online revenge, Chinese finger traps, philosophical house squatters, dim witted street thugs and grown men riding tricycles all intersect in this wild and proudly unconventional new dark comedy.

Watch the trailer for Groupers below. The film is now available on Dekkoo.

Filmmaker Alex Liu gets to the bottom of sex education in this frank and funny new documentary

A huge hit with critics and audiences at film festivals, A Sexplanation is a proudly queer and Asian American comedic sex documentary about the unusual search for love, connection and family acceptance.

Like many Americans, writer/director/host Alex Liu’s childhood sex education left much to be desired. Years of repression left him feeling disconnected from his own body, his desires as a gay man and even his family. Now out and proud in his thirties, Alex decides it’s time to turn his years of fear and loathing into something more positive and humorous.

From neuroscience labs to church pews, A Sexplanation features provocative conversations with psychologists, sex researchers and even a Jesuit priest. With humor and grit, Alex takes audiences on a playful and heartfelt journey from a shame-filled past to a happier, healthier and much sexier future.

Oh, and he also sits down with his parents. That’s a highlight that you won’t want to miss.

Watch the trailer for A Sexplanation below. The film is now available on Dekkoo.

Don’t miss the hilarious and heartwarming new Dekkoo-Original Short Film Making a Scene

With numerous short films to their names, we have become big fans of collaborative filmmakers Jono Mitchell and Madison Hatfield. Their work is intelligent, heartfelt and unapologetically queer.

Colorful, funny and deeply heartfelt, the pair’s latest short, Making a Scene, is a winning comedy that follows the warm, possibly too-supportive relationship between an overeager teenager and his eccentric mother.

When it comes time to rehearse an extracurricular scene for drama class, mom Carol and son Sammy (Vanessa Aranegui and Mack Bayda) hope that they may get some answers about the sexuality of mysterious schoolboy crush Ryan Riddle (Johnathon Grogan). He’s cute, he drives a convertible, he had a mustache in eighth grade, he was assigned drama when the weightlifting class ended up full and… above all else… he’s a good actor! But does he reciprocate his smitten scene partner’s feelings?

Making a Scene is now available on Dekkoo. You can also check out Mitchell and Hatfield’s other short films Max, If I’m Good and Thirty Candles – all of which are also currently streaming now on Dekkoo. We can’t recommend them more highly.

Short Film Spotlight: Shower Boys

An award-winning 9-minute short comedy from Swedish screenwriter Albin Abrahamsson and co-writer/director Christian Zetterberg, Shower Boys follows two young men who spend an afternoon struggling with their understanding of masculinity.

After a heated training match where their toughness is called into question, 12-year-olds Viggo and Noel (Lucas Andreasson and David Ramirez Knezevic) decide to spend some time together in the sauna.

The two friends begin to compete to see which of them is more “manly.” Though neither of them are looking to qualify for a top score, what feels only natural to them may be regarded quite differently by their parents.

Using nuanced writing and outstanding performances, Shower Boys hilariously reflects the complexity of growing up freely as a young boy and being able to explore your emotions and desires. While society tells boys they must fit into a specific box, this short film – and its characters – deconstruct all the usual stereotypes.

Watch a short trailer for Shower Boys below. The full short is now available on Dekkoo.