Gay Rights – Page 13 – Discover great gay stories.

New This Week – 10/26/18

Derek Jarman delivers a retelling of the life of the celebrated 17th-century painter through his brilliant, nearly blasphemous paintings and his flirtations with the underworld. Watch ‘Caravaggio’ now on Dekkoo!

James, a sexy, youthful sought-after instagram star in high-society and self-proclaimed ‘Trophy,’ is dumped by his wealthy live-in benefactor. Now he must learn that the real world is not the facade he’s built for himself on social media. Stream the award-winning short film ‘Trophy Boy’ on Dekkoo!

As 19-year-old Bennett Wallace navigates early sobriety, late adolescence, and the evolution of his gender identity, his mother makes her own transformation from resistance to acceptance of her trans son. ‘Real Boy’ is available to stream now on Dekkoo!

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Coming next week: A wicked ensemble comedy about a group of gay, lesbian and hetero friends and family connected by secrets and lies.

New This Week – 9/27/18

A drag queen (Chiwetel Ejiofor) comes to the rescue of a man (Joel Edgerton) who, after inheriting his father’s shoe factory, needs to diversify his product if he wants to keep the business afloat. ‘Kinky Boots’ is available to stream now on Dekkoo!

In the short film ‘Prom Night’, documentary and fiction is blended seamlessly bringing to life real stories about LGBT people and their experiences at prom.

In this raw, eye-opening documentary a group of impassioned theater students come together to produce a play aimed at shedding light on the many stigmas and equality-rights issues faced by LGBT youth in the United States today. ‘Break Through’ is available now on Dekkoo!

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Coming next week: A hypnotic story from Chile that is both an enticing family melodrama and an explicit erotic thriller.

Now Available: I Do

Seven years after the tragic death of his brother, Jack (David W. Ross) has been consumed with raising his young niece with his sister-in-law Mya (Alicia Witt). When the renewal of his work visa is denied, deportation to his native England seems imminent.

The quick solution is a duplicitous marriage to his best friend Ali (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) to secure his green card. Mindful of questioning from immigration, Ali moves into Jack’s apartment. When he falls head-over-heels in love with Mano (Maurice Compte), a sexy Latino-American architect, tensions bubble to the surface between Ali and Jack.

Prodded by her ex-girlfriend, Ali grows increasingly bitter about the arrangement she has entered into with Jack. She has every right to be mindful of the discriminatory laws when ICE officials storm into their apartment and Jack is nowhere to be found. Tough grilling by federal authorities settles it for Ali. She’s had enough and soon files for divorce from Jack.

As Jack searches for a new wife, the situation becomes even more challenging when Mano must return to Spain for a family crisis and Jack is to make a heart-breaking choice in order to live his life.

As it was released originally in 2012, it’s interesting to watch I Do today, only six years later, and see how much has changed and what remains the same. This brilliantly structured family drama from director Glenn Gaylord cleverly dramatizes the choices same-sex bi-national couples are forced to make.

I Do is now available on Dekkoo.

One Great Gay Shot – ‘I Do’ (2012)

‘I Do’ is available to stream now on Dekkoo.com!

New This Week – 8/10/18

A homosexual Catholic priest finds out during confessional that a young girl is being sexually abused by her father, and has to decide how to deal with both that secret and his own. ‘Priest’ is now available to stream on Dekkoo!

On Josh and Greg’s first date, they quickly realize that the generational divide between them is the least of their worries. The gay short film ‘Call Your Father’ is available to stream now on Dekkoo!

Two gay men celebrate their 25th anniversary by traveling across the country to get married in every state that will let them. The documentary ‘Married and Counting’ is now available to stream on Dekkoo!

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Coming next week – Matthias lives in Berlin. Matthias likes techno. Matthew likes Matthias. Matthew wants Matthias. Matthew wants to be Matthias.

Artist Paul Harfleet turns Pansies into Power

Watch Pansy now on Dekkoo!

Artist Paul Harfleet’s family had always accepted his sexuality, but it was a different story outside the home. Like many young gay people, he regularly faced abuse. So, like any artist worth his salt, he turned that trauma into something brilliant: The Pansy Project.

Harfleet plants pansies at sites where some form of homophobic abuse has taken place. He’ll go to the location, find the nearest source of soil and (generally without civic permission – ssshhh!) plants one unmarked pansy. The flower is then photographed (beautifully, we might add), uploaded to his website, given a title inspired by the abuse. Titles like “Let’s kill the Bati-Man!” and “Fucking Faggot!” reveal a frequent reality of the gay experience, which often goes unreported to authorities and by the media in certain parts of the world.

This simple action operates as a gesture of quiet resistance. Some pansies flourish, while others wilt. The artist began by planting pansies to mark his own experience of homophobia on the streets of Manchester, but now he plants them for others both on an individual basis and as part of various festivals and events.

Harfleet has visited cities all over Europe. To date, he has planted almost 300 individual pansies. His photographs have been exhibited internationally in Berlin, Paris, London and his hometown of Manchester, where the project began.

Following Harfleet as he brings the project to France for the first time, the new documentary Pansy is now streaming on Dekkoo. From Paris to Marseille, via Lille, Strasbourg and Avignon, Harfleet goes searching for testimonies and exposes the prejudices and discrimination gay people still face.

Check out the trailer for Pansy below and make sure to watch the full film on Dekkoo.

Pride Month Spotlight: Vito

“Enormously entertaining… Incisive and illuminating. This emotionally powerful documentary…is the stirring testament he deserves.” – The Hollywood Reporter

“Hugely moving and even more inspiring.” – LA Weekly

“I highly recommend it to anyone interested in pop culture, in civil rights, or in how the two are deeply connected. Through his story, ‘Vito’ becomes not just a biography but a history of his times, as a fight against discrimination became a fight for life.” – Time Magazine

“Involving… vibrant. A dramatic focal point in the history of gay rights.” – Variety

On June 27, 1969, a police raid on a Greenwich Village gay bar took a surprising turn when patrons decided it was time to fight back. As a riot erupted outside the Stonewall Inn, a new era in the Gay Rights Movement was born. You know the story.

Vito Russo, a 23-year-old film student, was among those in the crowd the unforgettable night. Over the next twenty years, until his death from AIDS in 1990, Vito would go on to become one of the most outspoken and inspiring activists in the LGBT community’s fight for equal rights.

In the midst of his involvement with Act Up and the fight against AIDS, Vito was also a prolific writer. His seminal book The Celluloid Closet explored the ways in which gay and lesbian characters were (most often subtly) portrayed on film, what lessons those characters taught gay and straight audiences, and how those negative images were at the root of society’s homophobia.

Even before the book was published, Vito was taking The Celluloid Closet on the road, traveling to gay film festivals and college campuses for an entertaining and informative lecture/ clip show that intertwined Vito’s love of show business and radical gay politics. He continued writing, lecturing, speaking out and acting up until just months before his death.

Directed by award-winner Jeffrey Schwarz (I Am Divine, Tab Hunter Confidential, The Fabulous Allen Carr), Vito paints a galvanizing portrait of this outspoken activist in the LGBT community’s struggle for equal rights, using period footage and film clips to capture a vibrant era of gay culture. It’s simply a must-see.

Vito is streaming right now on Dekkoo as one of our Pride Picks. Make sure you check it out if you haven’t seen it already!

Pride Month Spotlight: Raid of the Rainbow Lounge

On June 28, 2009, at 1:28 am, seven police officers and two agents from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission swarmed into the Rainbow Lounge, a newly opened gay bar in Fort Worth. The raid lasted approximately 30 minutes. It occurred 40 years, to the date, after the Stonewall riots in New York City – and the parallels are haunting.

Five patrons were zip tied, arrested for public intoxication and taken to jail. Multiple others were arrested and/or detained and then later released. One patron, Chad Gibson, was taken to the emergency room with life threatening injuries and was charges with assault and public intoxication. Police claimed the whole incident was simply a routine inspection.

Writer-director Robert L. Camina knew he needed to capture what was going on. His film, Raid of the Rainbow Lounge, recounts the events of that night, their aftermath and the massive changes that followed. Attending almost every single event related to the raid, camera in hand, Camina was able to interview over 35 people and record over 50 hours of rallies, city council meetings, counter-protests and more.

In the wake of the raid, Fort Worth city leaders and members of the LGBTQ community took significant steps to create a better world for all its citizens. Fort Worth is now a leader in LGBTQ equality.

“I hope this film inspires people to get involved in their own community,” said Camina in his original Director’s Statement. “While city leaders need to be held accountable for the safety and well-being for all the people they represent, members of the community also need to speak up and initiate change.”

Raid of the Rainbow Lounge embodies the ideals set out by many grassroots organizations seeking progressive change. It’s also a textbook example of how a powerful piece of cinema can be a tool for that change. Raid premiered in Fort Worth in 2012 to a sold-out crowd, rave reviews and a media frenzy. The screening proved to be a watershed moment. It provided closure, healing and strengthening the bridges built between the Fort Worth Police Department and the local LGBTQ Community. It went on to screen at more than 30 film festivals all across North America and picked up some major awards and extra positive attention along the way.

You can stream Raid of the Rainbow Lounge right now on Dekkoo as one of our Pride Picks!

Pride Month Spotlight: The Apple Tree

When Gabe and Jonathan (played as young men by Jay Renshaw and Ryland Shelton) fall in love in the 1940s, they decide to spend their life together in secret. But as the times changed, so died the couple – who were eventually able to express their love openly.

When Jonathan unexpectedly passes away years later, Gabe (played as an older man Jerry Bornstein) is faced with a dilemma that many LGBT elders encounter when they move into retirement homes… going back into the closet.

A 30-minute short film, writer-director Matthew Ladensack’s The Apple Tree screened world-wide at LGBT film festivals, and ended up winning the Best Picture prize at Out in the Desert. The short was very powerful at the time it was released and over the intervening years, with many baby boomers entering assisted living homes, the story the film tells has become much louder and stronger – so much so that Ladensack is in the process of adapting it into a feature film.

The writer/director’s newest draft earned a spot in the Top 50 of the world famous Tracking Board Launch Pad feature screenplay contest and was a semi-finalist at the Nashville Film Festival Feature Screenplay Contest. The feature will focus not only on aging in the gay community, but on two generations of gay men coming together – a new primary character, Colton, is a closeted high school football player who ends up forming a close bond with Gabe and seeing, first hand, the experiences of his LGBTQ fore-bearers.

Make sure you check out the original short film before the full-length feature arrives. The Apple Tree is currently streaming on Dekkoo. It’s one of our Pride Month picks.

Pride Month Spotlight: This is What Love in Action Looks Like

Though he’s know primarily for films like Blue Citrus Hearts and his Dekkoo Original Series Feral, writer-director Morgan Jon Fox set out to make a difference with his 2011 documentary This is What Love in Action Looks Like.

When 16-year-old Zach Stark told his parents that he was gay, they panicked, believing that something was psychologically wrong with him. They soon sent him to “Love In Action,” a religious organization that promised to “cure” homosexuality.

Founded in 1973, Love in Action, now known as “Restoration Path” is the oldest and largest ex-gay organizations in the United States. They take the position that homosexuality is strictly behavioral and can be cured. Originally for adults, they began a program for teens, many of whom sent involuntarily.

Their draconian methods for sexual “redemption” prompted Fox, already a well-established indie filmmaker, to both become active in the ensuing protest against the group as well as document it all through interviews with several youths who had been in the program, the then current director of “Love in Action” (himself, a “former gay”) and the many young protesters who were compelled to mobilize against the organization.

An important look at gay youth, intolerance and skewed religious beliefs, This is What Love in Action Looks Like is available on Dekkoo. It’s one of our heralded Pride Picks.