Category: Cross-Cultural Romance

Opposites attract in ‘Norwegian Dream,’ a romantic drama from the frozen shores of Scandinavia

Set in and around a fish factory in Trondheim, Norway, director Leiv Igor Devold’s Norwegian Dream follows two young men with completely different backgrounds and life experiences meet and fall into a cautious flirtation.

The men in question are Robert (Hubert Miłkowski), a hard-working Polish immigrant, and Ivar (Karl Bekele Steinland), the charismatic, adopted son of a wealthy business owner.

Amidst the conveyor belts, an unexpected relationship develops. Robert struggles to save his mother from financial troubles, while Ivar dreams of a life different from what his family expects of him. However, when Robert realizes that his growing bond with Ivar affects his standing among the other Polish workers, who are considering a strike, he begins to distance himself.

Can their growing love compete against the forces conspiring to keep them apart?

A heartwarming romantic drama from the frozen shores of Scandinavia, Norwegian Dream thoughtfully explores themes of cultural alienation, economic inequality, the search for sexual identity and the ways that opposites sometimes attract.

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

Head to the beach with ‘High Tide,’ one of the year’s most acclaimed gay films

Marco Pigossi delivers a brilliantly nuanced performance in High Tide as Lourenço, a Brazilian immigrant whose visa is nearing its expiration.

Heartbroken and adrift after his American boyfriend unexpectedly leaves him, Lourenco finds himself alone in Provincetown. Enveloped by the beauty and magic of the seaside community, he grows distressed by the day as his once hopeful future has dimmed into an emotional and physical state of limbo.

When he meets Maurice (James Bland), a kind, vacationing nurse, they form an unexpected connection. Together, they begin to find acceptance with each other while struggling to reconcile their uncertain futures.

For his feature directorial debut, world-renowned playwright Marco Calvani weaves a colorful tapestry of queer lives intersecting in one of North America’s most iconic gay destinations. Bill Irwin and Marisa Tomei co-star in this acclaimed romantic gay drama.

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

Short Film Spotlight: Genetica

A moving 15-minute short from Israeli filmmaker Chen Shahuda, Genetica follows Hemi, a 15-year-old boy who is taking swimming lessons… despite having zero interest in learning how to swim.

In spite of this, he is encouraged to continue with the lessons by his macho conservative father. Returning home one day, he stumbles upon a small dance studio and his finds that his interest is suddenly piqued.

After meeting Dani, a flirtatious a Russian dancer, between classes, the direction in which his heart is pulling him becomes all to clear.

When Hemi’s father discovers, however, that his son has been stealing money for dance classes, his newfound passion is quickly called into question.

Genetica is a bittersweet drama about following your heart, no matter what obstacles may present themselves.

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

An Argentine actor navigates the rough waters of New York City in ‘Nobody’s Watching’

From screenwriter Christina Lazaridi and co-writer/director Julia Solomonoff, Nobody’s Watching follows Nico (Guillermo Pfening), the handsome young star of a popular soap opera in his native Argentina.

At the height of a blossoming career, Nico suddenly and mysteriously leaves home to pursue an acting career in New York. But the promise of film work and a permanent visa evaporates as Nico – too blond to play Latino, too heavily accented to play anything else – finds himself working odd jobs and becoming more desperate, socially and financially.

Ultimately, he must confront the real reasons he left Argentina and take steps toward reclaiming a sense of his own worth.

Nobody’s Watching smartly observes the subtle boundaries that define class, race and opportunity in contemporary America, while shining a light on the immigrant experience and the role that perceived failures can play as stepping stones to self-discovery.

Watch the trailer for Nobody’s Watching below. The film is now streaming on Dekkoo.

Short Film Spotlight: The Singing Telegram

Matt (Eddie Grey) is an aspiring young musician from Sydney, Australia who is living with his boyfriend Daniel (Andrew Chappelle) in New York City.

Not quite living the cosmopolitan American lifestyle he’d imagined, he’s found himself stuck delivering singing telegrams in an effort to make ends meet.

Blinded by his desire to succeed, Matt risks losing the one part of his life he needs most… until a surprise telegram changes his perspective.

Starring, written and co-directed by up-and-coming Broadway actor Eddie Grey, The Singing Telegram is an adorable, colorful and ultimately uplifting romantic musical comedy short about learning to be grateful for what you have while never giving up on your dreams.

Watch a short teaser clip from The Singing Telegram below. The short film is now streaming on Dekkoo.

The gay boxing drama ‘Punch’ tells a hard-hitting story about love, loyalty and liberation

Up-and-coming New Zealand actor Jordan Oosterhof stars in the gay sports drama Punch as Jim, a seventeen-year-old boxer from a small town. Something of a golden boy, Jim is preparing for a fight that will elevate him to an early professional status.

All bets are on his climb to success. But his father, Stan, a demanding coach and a notorious alcoholic played by Tim Roth, is treated like a joke. He has given everything to see his son gain professional status and escape the brutality of his small world.

As Jim begins to rethink why he is fighting in the first place, his life tangles with Whetu, a razor-tongued, gay Maori boy played by Conan Hayes, who spends his days in an old shack down by the beach.

Along with his dog, Whetu cobbles together a fragile glamour and dreams of leaving town to become a musician. As Jim stumbles towards discovering what it really means to be a gay man, he is forced to see that strength has little to do with heroism.

Gorgeously crafted, powerfully acted and deeply romantic, Punch tells a hard-hitting story about love, loyalty and liberation.

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

Brace yourself for Pierre Creton’s acclaimed, sexually-charged fever dream drama ‘A Prince’

In the blissful and forbidding French countryside, an enveloping, cross-generational saga unfolds between an attractive young gardening apprentice and the three much older men who are training him – all of whom become instrumental in his professional tutelage as well as his sexual coming-of-age.

Inspired by memories of his own teenage years, outsider artist and real-life farmer Pierre Creton isn’t afraid to confront taboos while crafting this truly unusual, austere gay drama.

Unfolding at a deliberately slow pace, A Prince fuses together science, sensuality and meditation – culminating in the most sexually-charged film about horticulture you’re ever likely to see.

Winner of the Best French-Language Film Prize in the Directors’ Fortnight section of the 2023 Cannes Film Festival, A Prince offers up a singular vision of a quietly eroticized natural world. Placing it at number two on his list of the Best Films of 2023, John Waters called it “slow, spooky and poetically fucked up – in other words, perfect.”

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

A young intern comes between two middle-aged friends in the taboo-busting drama ‘Daddy’

Based on the 2010 stage play by co-star Dan Via, Daddy is centered around two middle-aged gay friends who find their relationship jeopardized by a much younger love interest.

Director and BearCity alum Gerald McCullouch also stars in the film as Colin McCormack, an aging stud who thinks he has it all – a great job, a steady stream of hot younger guys and a best friend whose devotion he takes for granted.

When a charming intern (played by Smash star Jaime Cepero) sweeps him off his feet, Colin sees a chance for something more: a family of his own. What he discovers instead is a shattering secret that may cost him everything – and everyone – he holds dear.

By turns funny, heartbreaking and hopeful, Daddy explores the universal need for love and connection.

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

Gregg Araki’s New Queer Cinema classic ‘The Living End’ is now available on Dekkoo!

One of the most electrifying films of the New Queer Cinema movement, The Living End left viewers stunned when it premiered at the now-infamous 1992 Sundance Film Festival. Brazenly transgressive, it may be even more shocking by today’s standards. Credited as ‘An Irresponsible Movie by Gregg Araki,’ the film’s take-no-prisoners story follows two HIV-positive men with nothing to lose.

Luke (Mike Dytri), a mischievous and reckless drifter, and Jon (Craig Gilmore), an initially uptight film critic, meet, unconventionally, after Luke has a run-in with a trio of gay-bashers.

A passionate affair – and a whole lot of trouble – soon ensue as the pair embark on a nihilistic road trip – fueled by whiskey, a gun and Luke’s motto of ‘fuck everything.’

Though it was referred to, at the time, as ‘the gay Thelma & Louise,’ The Living End has far more in common with the groundbreaking work of Andy Warhol, John Waters, Derek Jarman and Jean-Luc Godard, iconoclast filmmakers who are all paid some level homage throughout the film.

On a budget of just $20,000, Gregg Araki crafted this ultra-violent Gen-X classic as a primal scream in the face of the mounting AIDS crisis and its accompanying cultural stigma.

More than thirty years later, The Living End has lost none of it’s power or political charge. Now audiences new and old can experience it once again, in all it’s digitally-remastered glory, on Dekkoo. Check out the original trailer below.