Category: Transgender

Director Bertrand Mandico offers up a visually stunning queer allegory with ‘The Wild Boys’

The Wild Boys, the debut feature from prolific French short film director Bertrand Mandico, is ready to blow your mind.

Set on a small island at the beginning of the 20th century, the film tells the tale of five adolescent boys (all played by female-identifying actresses) who come from wealthy families, but find themselves increasingly drawn to the occult.

Looking to explore lives of crime and transgression, the group collectively commits a brutal crime – aided by ‘Trevor,’ a strange deity of chaos they can’t seem to control.

The boys are soon punished, forced to board a boat with a lecherous sea captain who is hell-bent on taming their ferocious appetites. They arrive on a lush island where dangers and pleasures abound… and the boys start to transform in both mind and body.

Gorgeously shot on 16mm and brimming with homoeroticism, genderfluidity and sly, subversive humor, The Wild Boys will take you on a heady, hedonistic journey you won’t soon forget. It’s a colorful, unique and strangely funny underground queer masterpiece.

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

Andrea Riseborough and Demi Moore star in the wild queer pastiche ‘Please Baby Please’

Andrea Riseborough, Harry Melling and Demi Moore star in this neon-lit fantasia about newlyweds who find themselves on diverging sexual journeys.

A wildly inventive and wickedly funny 1950s pastiche from acclaimed filmmaker Amanda Kramer, Please Baby Please follows Arthur and Suze, two seemingly straight arrows who live an outwardly traditional lifestyle as the Lower East Side’s most bohemian Eisenhower-era couple.

The pair find their cage rattled when they witness a murder and become the new targets of a gang of sadistic, leather-clad greasers known as ‘The Young Gents.’ Their initial thrust of fear soon evolves, arousing previously unsuspected emotions and feelings of sexuality in both of the young lovers.

This sudden exposure to flamboyant masculinity unlocks the realization that Suze is an aspiring leather daddy who mistook herself for a housewife. Meanwhile, the perpetually sensitive Arthur’s obsessive gender trouble goes sideways when ‘Young Gent’ Teddy sparks his dormant queer desires.

Please Baby Please presents a full spectrum of underground fetishism and seductive musical asides, along with delicious cameos from Karl Glusman and Cole Escola. Visionary filmmaker Amanda Kramer pegs the hetero hell-scape of the 1950s in a witty, syncopated riff that plays like a high camp emission from your wildest dreams – bathed in silk, sweat and bisexual lighting!

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

We guarantee you’ve never experienced anything quite like ‘Enter the Drag Dragon’

Get ready for a ‘Drag-Fu’ odyssey filled with face-crunching action, corset-busting comedy, gut-munching horror and soul-touching musical numbers.

We guarantee you’ve never experienced anything quite like Enter the Drag Dragon, a brand-new action-comedy-horror-musical from the people who brought you Jesus Christ: Vampire Hunter.

Enter the Drag Dragon follows Crunch (Jade London), a part-time amateur detective and a full-time drag queen. His lifelong best friend is Jaws (Beatrice Beres), a roller skating entrepreneur and fast-food delivery girl.

The oddball pair – no strangers to fast times, adventure and action – have been through a lot together. They spend their days working hard and their nights watching kung-fu flicks in the abandoned movie theatre they’ve lived in since childhood.

Their popcorn-devouring bliss is cut short, however, when Crunch takes on the biggest case of his career. Tracking down a stolen panting that might reveal the mythical treasure of the Aztec Mummy, he discovers that he has much more to fear than the supposed undead army that guards the legendary loot.

He soon finds himself over his head dealing with corrupt cops, zombies, dangerous mobsters, a lost puppy, ninjas, ghosts, androids and, of course, a budding romance! With mounting obstacles, Crunch realizes that he can’t handle this one on his own, and must team up with Jaws if he wants to survive, let alone solve the case.

Ready-made for the “Midnight Madness” crowd, Enter the Drag Dragon offers up a truly twisted mix of Troma films, John Waters and Bruce Lee.

Watch the trailer for Enter the Drag Dragon below. The film is now streaming on Dekkoo.

Short Film Spotlight: Family Affair

From writer-producer Ernest Anemone and director Julio Dowansingh, Family Affair is a heartwarming 15-minute queer comedy short about the secrets we keep, the friendships we make and, as the title would suggest, the families we’re born into.

Bear D’Angelo stars as Tanner, a high school senior who seems to have everything going for him. He’s smart, he’s athletic and he’s popular… but there’s something – or rather someone – taking up his time lately. And Tanner feels that, at all costs, he must keep it a secret from his mother.

We don’t want to give away any more of the plot because there are some delightful surprises in store for viewers who aren’t sure where the story is going.

Created by a cast and crew mostly consisting of queer and BIPOC creatives, Family Affair tells an uplifting story about one mother-son relationship while aiming to normalize and destigmatize queer identities across the board.

Watch a short teaser trailer for Family Affair below. The film is now streaming on Dekkoo.

Alexandra Billings stars in the endearing and inspiring comedy-drama ‘Queen Tut’

‘Transparent’ actress Alexandra Billings stars in the endearing comedy-drama Queen Tut as a trans stage veteran who takes an aspiring seamstress and drag queen under her wings.

Following the death of his mother, Egyptian-raised teen Nabil (Ryan Ali) reluctantly moves to Toronto to live with his traditionally-minded father. There he meets Malibu (Billings) who is on her own crusade to protect Mandy’s, her drag nightclub and queer haven, from demolition.

The shy Nabil, wanting to learn how to sew like his late seamstress mother, finds a drag mentor in the exuberant Malibu, who makes all her own dresses.

As the boy begins to find his true self, the local community’s fight to save their favorite nightclub quickly escalates, pitting Nabil against his architect father and drag queens and queers against the gentrification-minded establishment.

Funny, inspiring and packed with memorable performances, Queen Tut is a rousingly entertaining and insightful coming-out drag tale which has left audiences cheering at film festivals all around the globe.

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

Short Film Spotlight: Sapphire

A trippy, visually inventive British drama from director Leanne Hanley and screenwriter Harry Hains, Sapphire tells the story of a troubled young poet who is caught between two identities.

Ethan (Andreja Pejic) struggles with an addiction to both love and drugs. When they meet an alluring man on the street, a relationship develops that sends them deeper into their worst tendencies.

The films flashes back and forth through time, observing different periods in Ethan’s life – the abyss of addiction, the thrill of first love, a moment of reflection and honesty in a therapist’s office and, finally, a fantasy world where they’re forced to make a choice.

Ethan looks to free himself from the abyss by becoming Sapphire, a glamorous alter ego. But whether or not this new identity will be enough to save them from their inner demons remains to be seen.

Watch a short trailer for Sapphire below. The film is now streaming on Dekkoo.