Category: International Film

Queer Classics: We Were One Man

Years ahead of its time, We Were One Man is a period piece, originally released in France in 1979, that dared to depict a budding romance between two men.

From director Philippe Vallois, the film tells a story of gay love between two soldiers. Guy (Serge Avedikian), a peasant farmer, is trying to live a simple life during the turmoil of World War II. He lives in a small farmhouse outside a sleepy village in France, where he has almost no friends.

Everything starts to change when he stumbles across Rolf (Piotr Stanislas), an injured German soldier. The simple, naive Guy brings Rolf home and nurses him back to health. While convalescing, a relationship slowly builds between the two men.

Soon the pair are frolicking naked in the woods and swimming in the stream. Thin, boyish Guy is a contrast to the blond, hard bodied Rolf. The passion that stirs between them that becomes hard to deny. As their connection grows deeper, they find a happy escape in one another, content to be sheltered and loved… until the war asserts itself back into their lives.

We Were One Man is now available on Dekkoo.

‘The First Fallen’ is a profoundly moving 1980s period drama from Brazil

Set in 1983 The First Fallen stars Johnny Massaro as a young biologist who returns home from studies abroad and starts to feel that there is something wrong with his body.

This is the beginning of the AIDS crisis – when the first wave of the epidemic hit Brazil. Lives will change, friends will be lost and gained and the future is suddenly uncertain.

With energy, humor and righteous anger, director Rodrigo de Oliveira (the award-winning filmmaker behind Tu Me Manques) creates a drama full of powerful performances, vibrant color and dramatic craft.

Partly entertainment and partly a work of cinematic activism, The First Fallen takes audiences on an emotional journey, offering up a powerful ode to the victims of the AIDS crisis and the community of solidarity and support that formed during those terrifying early days.

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

Short Film Spotlight: All the Awards I Never Gave You

A 16-minute short film from director Caio Scot and screenwriters Lucas Drummond and Mel Carvalho, All the Awards I Never Gave You takes place entirely in one public restroom during a prestigious awards ceremony in Brazil.

Lucas Drummond and Matheus Campos star in the film as two young actors on the rise. When they unexpectedly reunite in the bathroom, they find that their feelings for one another are far from resolved.

The two promising young men soon try to come to some kind of an understanding while struggling with the fact that they’re forced to keep their relationship a secret from the public and the film industry that employs them.

Scot, Drummond and Carvalho’s previous short film, 2019’s After That Party earned the trio a great reputation on the international film festival circuit – screening at over 60 different events and picking up nine different awards.

Watch the trailer for All the Awards I Never Gave You below. The full short film is now available to stream on Dekkoo.

Body language is used to provocative ends in the sensual gay drama ‘Easy Tiger’

In Easy Tiger, a brand-new gay drama from Belgium, much of the story is told through body language – expressing deep desires in a way that words cannot.

Easy Tiger tells the story of a psychologist whose seemingly perfect city life is upended by an unexpected moment with a client, a deaf man who awakens a desire deep within him.

Their charged encounter has a ripple effect on the psychologist’s life. His inescapable desires for his male client force to look at who he does not want to be in order to find out who he actually is.

French and English are used sparingly throughout the film, but its narrative largely unfolds through International Sign Language as director Karel Tuytschaever explores physicality and the body itself as a storytelling device.

With this unique approach, Easy Tiger is a uniquely inclusive feature that aims to provide, as much as possible, the same experience for both hearing and non or partially-hearing viewers.

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

Short Film Spotlight: The Carer

A touching 15-minute short film from writer-director Christine Parker, The Carer stars veteran British character actor Peter Eyre as Ari, a sophisticated and urbane gay man who moves into an elder care facility and encounters Beau, played by Barney Glover.

Beau, an exceptionally handsome a former thief, is in the process of straightening his life out and has now been put in charge of Ari’s day-to-day care. Their unlikely meeting changes both men in profound ways – forcing Ari, who recently lost his long-term partner, to examine the tenderness of his past while Beau looks toward the possibility of a brighter future.

Examining a uniquely intimate professional relationship, The Carer is equally heartwarming and heartbreaking.

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

Pride Month Spotlight: Queer Docs

For Pride Month this year, we wanted to shine a spotlight on some amazing documentaries.

A mix of films both underseen and celebrated, heartbreaking and triumphant, with varied tones and subject matter, this collection of docs take us deep inside true queer stories of life, loss and love.

Bridegroom, Matt Shepard is a Friend of Mine and Gemmel & Tim tell true stories of people taken from us too soon, but whose lives and legacies have left us left us changed for the better.

50 Years of Fabulous, Oriented, A Queer Country and Pride & Protest take us to specific places to celebrate the power of community. Drag Race star Jamal Sims’ doc When the Beat Drops offers up a fun and fast-paced history of bucking in Atlanta.

An Act of Love and This is What Love in Action Looks like capture activism in unlikely places. Finally, Electroboy and Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood explore two fascinating queer figures from two very different time periods.

The Pride Month Spotlight: Queer Docs collection is available on Dekkoo now – and all throughout the month of June.

Short Film Spotlight: Mar

Mar follows Xavier and Eduardo (Lourenço Seruya and João Santos Silva), two lovers who decide to spend their summer vacation in a small town on the coast of Portugal. While planning their trip, they never expected to be be faced with a dark mystery that leads to seduction and betrayal.

The pair aim to visit a childhood friend named Cristovao (Diogo Tavares) – unaware that he’s harboring an explosive secret known only to his enigmatic mother (Sylvie Rocha). When that secret is later revealed, sexual tensions begin to rise and someone’s fate is unexpectedly sealed.

From writer-director William Vitoria, Mar is a tense, gorgeously shot 25-minute short inspired by old-school erotic thrillers.

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