Category: New Release

Don’t Miss Writer-Director Marco Berger’s New Thriller Young Hunter

Ezequiel (Juan Palbo Cestaro) is a fifteen-year-old kid on the cusp of his sexual awakening. When he meets the handsome, twenty-one-year-old Mono (Lautaro Rodriguez), he’s so excited that he jumps into a quick relationship before he’s had time to really consider whether or not it’s a good idea.

Mono invites Ezequiel to his cousin’s villa, to spend a weekend together. But, while returning from the trip, Mono disappears completely, no longer responding to any of Ezekiel’s texts. The situation is confusing… until Chino (Juan Barberini), Mono’s cousin, sends him a hidden camera video of Ezekiel and Mono having sex, blackmailing him into making his own sex tape with a minor to be sold on the dark web, in order to keep his secret hidden. 

Ezequiel, with an impossible choice, decides to try seducing Juan Ignacio (Patricio Rodríguez), a thirteen-year-old boy whom he knows from school and suspects has a crush on him. Ezequiel soon turns from prey to hunter – against his own will.

From prolific director Marco Berger (Absent, Taekwondo, Plan B), Young Hunter is an intense thriller that has earned rave reviews on the film festival circuit. Watch the trailer for the film below. It’s available now on Dekkoo.

A thoughtful LGBTQI doc takes a look at what lies Between the Shades

The documentary Between the Shades seeks to put faces to the letters that make up LGBTQI and examine how those individual letters, and the groups they represent, have evolved and expanded since the Stonewall riots. All the while the film also takes a look at the immense power of labels and the transcendence of love.

Director Jill Salvino invited fifty people, each with a connection to the LGBTQI community, to begin a conversation by sharing their stories. Between the Shades features many voices, among them: Beth Malone (of Broadway’s “Fun Home”), actress Kathy Najimy and former Democratic National Committee Treasurer Andrew Tobias. No film can ever capture the immense diversity of the LGBTQI community, but this film puts in a lot of effort to try.

The New York Times said that the film “suggests that human sexuality is far more nuanced than labels or even a linear scale can capture… it’s a conversation that feels right for the times in which we live.”

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

The critically-acclaimed drama Tremors is now available on Dekkoo

In this deeply personal follow-up to his landmark debut film Ixcanul, writer-director Jayro Bustamante shifts his focus from rural Guatemala to the denizens of Guatemala City, but once again sets his sights on an individual caught between two seeming irreconcilable worlds.

When handsome and charismatic Pablo (Juan Pablo Olyslager) arrives at his affluent family’s house, everyone is eagerly awaiting the return of their beloved son, devoted father and caring husband. A seemingly exemplary pillar of Guatemala City’s Evangelical Christian community, Pablo’s announcement that he intends to leave his wife for another man sends shock waves through the family.

As Pablo tries to acclimate to his new life in the city’s gay subculture with the liberated Francisco (Mauricio Armas Zebadúa), his ultra-religious family does everything in its power to get their prodigal son back on track, no matter the cost.

A sensation on the international film festival circuit, Tremors has received great critical acclaim. “Tremors is a prodigiously gut-wrenching demand for change; the film isn’t kindly asking for tolerance but bluntly exposing the torment inflicted in the name of a prejudiced God,” said Carlos Aguilar in The Wrap. “It’s a magnificently unflinching film from a master director in the making, whose thunderous strength will surely make waves in Bustamante’s Central American homeland and abroad.”

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

The Acrobat is a complex relationship drama from director Rodrigue Jean

Montreal is snowed under. While the downtown cranes dance their hypnotic ballet, two strangers meet randomly in an unfinished apartment. Their chance encounter leads to a violent attraction and a dependency beyond reason. One man is a Russian-born professional acrobat whose future is jeopardized by a broken leg. The other is a buttoned-down, well-groomed man of few words. Which one dominates? Which one manipulates? As it turns out, love is painful and human relations are complex.

Featuring brave performances from lead actors S̩bastien Ricard and Yury Paulau, The Acrobat is a complex adult relationship drama. French-Canadian writer-director Rodrigue Jean has a history of pushing boundaries Рespecially with his 2008 documentary Men for Sale, about life on the streets for a group of Montreal sex workers; and the 2014 drama Love in the Time of Civil war, a narrative look at a similar subject. Tackling taboo sexual dynamics this time around, The Acrobat is no exception.

Watch the trailer for The Acrobat below. The film is available now to Dekkoo subscribers.

Take a wild journey through San Francisco’s nightlife with the comedy Bathroom Stalls & Parking Lots

Leo (Thales Corrêa) is a Brazilian ex-pat living in Los Angeles who has been maintaining an online relationship with a man in San Francisco. His friends Donnie (Izzy Palazzini) and Hunter (Oscar Manski) urge Leo to come up to the City by the Bay to find the object of his affection so that he can at last take the relationship into the real world. The trouble is: he’s not really sure where to find him.

Over the course of one night these three men embark on a wild sexual journey that will change their lives forever. Bathroom Stalls and Parking Lots takes a hilarious look at the culture of romantic relationships among gay/bisexual male youth in the Castro District – as characters explore what it means to date in today’s hook-up culture, and how dating apps have turned relationships into disposable experiences.

Watch the trailer for Bathroom Stalls and Parking Lots below. The film is now available on Dekkoo.

Short Film Spotlight: Long Haul

The 21-minute short film Long Haul is a coming-of-age road drama set in the world of American long-haul trucking.

Bo (Jacob Buster) is an ultra-conservative teen who goes on a cross-country delivery job with his estranged father (Jeffrey Hanson). During the journey, the son struggles with his parents’ divorce and discovering that his father is gay.

Based on writer-director Bryan Fugal’s own life, Long Haul is a deeply personal story. “The son character is based on a combination of me and my siblings,” said the filmmaker. “And the father character is based on my biological father. I think it is a unique and very relevant story to our time.”

The screenplay for Long Haul was a semi-finalist in international screenplay competitions, including the PAGE International Screenwriting Awards, Screen Craft Short Screenplay Contest, and was a finalist for the David Ross Fetzer Foundation Grant for Emerging Artists. In addition, the screenplay has been endorsed by several other noted artists and film producers, including Arthur Van Wagenen, Mac Reynolds of Imagine Dragons, Bryce Fillmore and Kendall Wilcox.

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

Max, a new Dekkoo-Original Short Film, launches September 23rd

Mark your calendars, gay film fans. The brand-new Dekkoo-Original Short Film Max will be available starting September 23rd. Written by and starring Jono Mitchell and directed by Kristina Arjona, the ten-minute film follows two men, total strangers, who form a tenuous bond in a hotel room.

Jeremy (Mitchell) is very recently divorced – in fact, it just happened. After his marriage started to become casually abusive, he knew it was time to pull away. But that doesn’t make it any less painful. Coming out on the other side of signing the papers, his first step is to meet up with an alluring sex-worker who goes by the name Max (Gregory Piccirilli).

Despite Jeremy’s best efforts, he’s not able to get too much info out of Max about his real name or personal life, but the connection that they soon form becomes deep and authentic. Jeremy is in pain and Max, though he may be a hired hand, is ready to lend a comforting bare shoulder (and much more if the mood strikes).

With terrific, subtly emotional performances and skillful writing and direction that teases the larger world and lives beyond their room, Max could easily be expanded into a longer, most expansive feature. The film also brings up a lot of questions about the nature of empathy in transactional relationships.

Check out the trailer, along with some exclusive stills from the film and the poster below and make sure to watch and show your support in the comments when it becomes available on Dekkoo on 9/23!

Now Available: Two

TWO: The Story Of Roman and Nyro documents the 12-year journey of legendary songwriter Desmond Child and his lifelong partner Curtis Shaw, and the extraordinary way they met and connected with Angela Whittaker, the woman who would carry their twin sons, Roman and Nyro, into the world.

From preconception through the boys’ first 10 years, TWO is the personal and powerful story of these unique individuals whose lives become inextricably woven together in magical and unexpected ways. TWO is testament to the universal power and ultimate triumph of love – that it is love that makes a family, affirming modern families may be modern in their making, but timelessly human at their core.

Watch an extended trailer for the film below. TWO: The Story Of Roman and Nyro is now available on Dekkoo.

The controversial Russian import Outlaw makes its debut on Dekkoo

Director Ksenia Ratushnaya’s bold first feature, Outlaw shines a spotlight on modern LGBTQ life (and strife) in Russia.

Highly controversial, this provocative and visually dazzling new film from director Ksenia Ratushnaya and producer Veronika Chibis tells two parallel love stories. One is a love triangle between a gay teen named Nikita (Viktor Tarasenko), a violent jock named Alpha (Gleb Kaluzhny) and a popular girl, the eponymous Outlaw (Liza Kashintseva). The other story follows a romance between a general (Sergey Epishev) transgender dancer (Evengry Okorokov) in the Soviet 1980s.

Due to Russia’s “gay propaganda law,” introduced in 2013 and used to suppress public discourse over LGBTQ issues, the film has had a rough time reaching audiences domestically. It is, however, available now to audiences via Dekkoo.

Watch the trailer for Outlaw below.

 

Now Available: The Lawyer

Life just drifts by for corporate lawyer Marius (Eimutis Kvosciauskas), until he finds an unexpected connection for the dark and handsome Ali (Dogac Yildiz), a Syrian refugee who doubles as a sex-cam worker.

After Marius’ estranged father passes away, his infatuation intensifies. He inevitably flies to Belgrade to meet Ali in person, in hopes of a romantic week with his mysterious object of desire. Although off-camera, things might not be exactly as they seem.

The newest feature from prolific Lithuanian filmmaker Romas Zabarauskas (the director behind We Will Riot, Porno Melodrama and You Can’t Escape Lithuania – all available now on Dekkoo), The Lawyer is an engrossing and heartfelt romantic drama. Reportedly, it is also the first feature film made in one of the Baltic countries about male-male love.

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