Category: Cross-Cultural Romance

Short Film Spotlight: Solitude

Young Zeph’s (Jael Saran) relationship with his best friend and secret crush, Sol (Da’Von J. Solomon), is called into question as the pair spend increasingly more time together preparing for an art exhibition.

Desperate to save her son, Zeph’s mother Augustine (Marlo Stroud) stages an ambush to confront him. Events soon take a grim turn, forcing Zeph to question how he will reconcile who he really is with the person he’s pretending to be for the sake of his disapproving family.

A 17-minute short from Atlanta-based writer-director Knial Saunders, Solitude is a deeply affecting vignette, following the burgeoning sexuality of a queer black teenager who is forced to make the painful choice of conforming to family expectations or finally reaching out for romantic love and self acceptance.

Check out the poster for Solitude below. The short film is now available on Dekkoo.

Don’t miss ‘Joyland,’ a critically-acclaimed, award-winning queer romance from Pakistan

Banned in its home country of Pakistan, the critically-acclaimed Joyland explores the many sides of love and desire in a patriarchal society.

Gentle and timid, Haider (Ali Junejo) lives with his wife, his father, his elder brother, pregnant sister-in-law and their three daughters in Lahore, Pakistan. As the family eagerly anticipates the birth of a baby boy to continue their family line, Haider secretly takes a job as a background dancer at an erotic theatre.

The unusual position shakes up the steadfast traditional dynamics of his household and enables Haider to break out of his shell. He also finds himself intrinsically drawn to Biba (Alina Khan), the strong-willed trans woman who runs the show.

Soon, Haider and Biba fall into a secret summer romance, which opens his eyes and ultimately his worldview, in ways unexpected, intimate, and heartbreaking.

Writer-director Saim Sadiq calls Joyland “an homage to all the women, men and trans people who pay the human cost of patriarchy.” It is also a celebration of the desire that creates unlikely bonds and the love that immortalizes them.

Watch the trailer for Joyland below. The film is now streaming on Dekkoo.

Acclaimed filmmaker Eytan Fox explores queer life in Tel Aviv in ‘The Bubble’

From Eytan Fox, the director behind Sublet, Walk on Water and and the beloved 2002 romance Yossi and Jagger, The Bubble follows a trio of charming and sexy Israeli twenty-somethings who share an apartment in Tel Aviv’s hippest district.

The group includes the idealistic Lulu (Daniella Wircer), the goofy and flamboyant Yali (Alon Freidman) and the moody Noam (Ohad Knoller), who works in a record store when he’s not doing dispiriting reserve duty at a Palestinian checkpoint.

They love their carefree lives inside Tel Aviv’s “bubble,” where the strains of a violent outside world are kept at bay. But the bubble is threatened, and nearly bursts, when Noam hooks up with and gradually falls in love with Ashraf (Yousef ‘Joe’ Sweid), a young Palestinian man who cannot legally work or reside within the borders of Tel Aviv.

Seeing Ashraf’s situation as a chance to act on their principles of peaceful coexistence, the three roommates go to great lengths attempting to smuggle Ashraf into their home. How their ideals run headlong into tragic realities forms the core tension of this smart, keenly felt drama – originally released in 2006 to great acclaim on the international film festival circuit.

Watch the trailer for The Bubble below. The film is now streaming on Dekkoo.

‘Sandbag Dam’ is a sensitive, stunningly photographed portrait of youthful masculinity

Croatian director Cejen Cernic’s acclaimed romantic drama Sandbag Dam examines an internal battle that forms between small town ideals and burgeoning gay desires.

Former childhood friends Marko and Slaven (Lav Novosel and Andrija Zunac) shared a secret teenage romance before being found out – which resulted in Slaven’s father casting him out of the family.

Years later, Marko has become a local arm-wrestling champion and plans to start a career close to home with his younger brother. When Slaven returns after the death of his imposing father, their reunion threatens the delicate balance of Marko’s life and the traditional future he sees for himself.

As their town prepares for a coming flood, Marko will have to deal with his own torrent of buried emotions and decide what path he wants to follow: the life that was chosen for him or a more authentic one of his own making with Slaven.

Set in rural Croatia, this relaxed, slice-of-life drama skillfully captures the everyday rhythms of small town life while telling a gripping tale of forbidden gay love and long-awaited second chances.

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

Check out the first season of ‘People Like Us’ – now available on Dekkoo!

Following the lives of four gay men, People Like Us, a short-form series from creator Leon Cheo, offers up a poignant reflection and insightful look at being gay in modern-day Singapore.

Issac (Steven Lim) is a senior private banker exploring new freedoms after living a double life hosting chem-sex parties. Ridzwan (Irfan Kasban) is a discreet accountant who keeps his work and social life separate. Joel (Josh Crowe) is a smart, but woefully impatient public relations yuppie who struggles to maintain long-term relationships. Lastly, Rai (Hermant Ashoka), is a young and idealistic conscripted soldier who is searching for love.

These characters drift into one another’s worlds – and beds – as they navigate love, lust and life in the big city.

In addition to the sexual escapades and relationships that unfold between the characters, People Like Us explores themes of acceptance, community support, the challenges of dating, substance addiction, and HIV awareness in the local LGBTQ+ community.

Check out the first season of People Like Us – now available on Dekkoo! The next two seasons will be available in the coming months.

A filmmaker searches for his lost brother in the riveting documentary ‘Jimmy in Saigon’

The critically-acclaimed documentary Jimmy in Saigon begins as a personal exploration into the mysterious death and radical life of Jimmy McDowell, an American 24-year-old Vietnam veteran who died as a civilian in Saigon in 1972 – all while filmmaker Peter McDowell, Jimmy’s younger brother, was only five years old.

While investigating Jimmy’s past, Peter takes us from the Midwest of the United States to Vietnam, France and back home again.

In his quest to get to know his brother, he uncovers a hidden romance, new family ties and a remarkable global love story.

Executive produced by Dan Savage, this riveting and emotionally resonant film offers up a poignant glimpse into the short life of a young man whose sole desire was to be loved, despite a myriad of social obstacles and the fog of war.

Watch the trailer for Jimmy in Saigon below. The documentary is now streaming on Dekkoo.

‘The Mouth of the Wolf’ is an intimate documentary hybrid with evocative atmosphere

Vintage images of a city on the decline are woven into the story of one queer couple separated for decades by prison bars in The Mouth of the Wolf, a hauntingly beautiful film from Italian director Pietro Marcello.

Vincenzo returns to Genoa after many years away, some spent in prison. He tours the city searching for the places of his childhood and the Genoa idealized in his father’s stories.

Although the reality of the city has changed, waiting for him in the small house in the ghetto is Mary Motta, his lifelong companion and a trans woman. Through material ranging from 1920’s home movies to scenes of massive ship launches and dynamited machinery, Marcello pays a mournful tribute to Genoa’s degeneration. Its fortunes are compared with those of shipwrecked survivors – as well as the two lead characters.

An intimate work with an evocative atmosphere told using a hybrid narrative structure that blends fiction and documentary The Mouth of the Wolf won the Teddy Award at the Berlin Film Festival when it was first released in 2009.

Watch the trailer for The Mouth of the Wolf below. The film is now available on Dekkoo.

Tsai Ming-liang’s ‘Days’ is one of the decade’s best and most underseen gay films

For decades, the great Taiwanese filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang has been directing exquisite examinations of alienation, isolation and the fleeting beauty of human connection – often in collaboration with his muse, actor Lee Kang-sheng.

His award-winning, critically acclaimed 2020 film, Days, undoubtedly stands as one of his best, sparest and most intimate works.

Lee once again stars as a variation on himself, wandering through a lonely urban landscape and seeking treatment in Hong Kong for a chronic illness. At the same time, a young Laotian immigrant working in Bangkok goes about his daily routine.

These two solitary men eventually come together in a moment of healing, tenderness and sexual release.

Among the most cathartic entries in Tsai’s filmography, Days is a work of longing, constructed with the director’s customary brilliance at visual composition and crafted with a profound dose of empathy.

Watch the trailer for Days below. The film is now streaming on Dekkoo.

‘M/M’ is a provocative, psychosexual drama about desire, identity and obsession

Matthew (Antoine Lahaie), a young Canadian, has just moved to Berlin. He’s arrived looking to make a fresh start, but feels the isolation of living in a strange, new city.

When he meets the alluring Matthias (Nicolas Maxim Endlicher), he finds himself completely entranced. Beautiful and charismatic, Matthias is everything Matthew wants to be.

Soon Matthew’s interest escalates, becoming a full-blown obsession. He begins to transform himself to embody the object of his desire. When Matthias gets into a motorcycle accident, the opportunity seems too perfect. Matthew does everything he can to literally become Matthias and usurp his life.

While in a coma in the hospital, Matthias’ waking life, his dreams and his memories all begin to blur. It becomes impossible to tell where reality ends and the artificial begins.

A surreal riff on Single White Female from provocative filmmaker Drew Lint, M/M employs striking visuals to tell an entrancing and unnerving story about loneliness, narcissism and queer psycho-sexual obsession.

Watch the trailer for M/M below. The film is now streaming on Dekkoo.

A mother and her gay son seek out a better life in the comedy ‘Potato Dreams of America’

Obsessed with old Hollywood movies and concerned for her son’s future in 1980s USSR, Lena becomes a mail-order bride and moves to the United States.

Though she hopes to give her son, Potato, a better life, things veer off course when his burgeoning sexuality and love of New Queer Cinema clash with his new father’s political and religious points of view.

Stylized and deliriously campy, Potato Dreams of America conjures a portrayal of the American dream that is as hopeful and hilarious as it is dizzying.

Featuring a star-studded LGBTQ+ cast – including Lea DeLaria and Jonathan Bennett – this autobiographical crowd-pleaser from writer/director Wes Hurley, a major hit with audiences at film festivals all around the world, is designed to make you laugh and spark some whimsical wonder along the way.

Watch the trailer for Potato Dreams of America below. The film is now available on Dekkoo.