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Showing posts from June, 2018

Gay Short Films : 57

Mom's the Word (Canada) A short and funny comedy of a conversation between a gay son and his mother when she finds a cock ring and mistakes it for a napkin holder. How should a son tell her exactly what the toy is? The Last Leatherman of the Vale of Cashmere (USA) An aging leatherman makes a weekly pilgrimage the cruising destination of his youth, when leather and cruising was in thing. Paul (USA) Paul, a young man diagnosed with HIV in the late 1980s, attends a dinner with a family he's never met. A very poignant and dignified film about what feelings and loss of self dignity that the individuals went through through 80s because of this virus. One Last Chance (USA) Bed conversation between two fuck buddies, where one wants to know how come the other person has never been interested in him outside of sex! In The Paint (USA) College basketball player Kollin is preparing to enter the NBA Draft. He must decide if he wants to continue playing the game down low o

EastSiders: Seasons 1 to 3 (Web Series)

Finally I finished watching all 3 seasons of this web series. Apparently the show started on youtube with its first 2 episodes and now the season three premiered on Netflix. This itself tells us the growth and trajectory that the show , cast and story has followed. I try to keep my expectations real low when I am watching US based gay content, because more often than not, it disappoints. The hugely popular show “Looking” had left a void which I think a lot of folks are trying to fill in. This series comes to a very close and I would highly recommend. Touted as a dark-comedy, the show primarily focusses on the couple Cal & Thom. Cal is an artist with a very rich mother and Thom is a writer. The series starts with Thom’s admission that he has been cheating on Cal with another guy Jeremy. Not sure how to deal with this, a series of events lead to both Thom and Cal sleeping with Jeremy separately. Jeremy likes them both but eventually they both don’t want anymore to do with him ,

October Moon 2: November Son

When I started watching the film, I wasn’t aware of it being a sequel. Only 15 minutes into the film, I realized the fact and so had to go read my review of the original film to jog my memory. Now that I remembered the original story, this film started to make more sense. This time, however, the focus of the movie isn't really the gay guys; but it's the women dealing with the aftermath of how the first movie ended. Of course, gay characters are still integral to this story. The new gay on the block Eli, kind of accidentally rents himself Corin & Jake’s old apartment. He interviews with Judith (Elliot’s mom) and somehow starts getting injected into Eliott’s life. Judith’s negative attitude toward her son's sexuality in the first film was a chief ingredient to the tragedy that ensued. Enter an old man, George, who is introduced as Eli’s father, starts dating Corin’s former co-worker Nancy. But something doesn’t feel right. Neither father-son relationship and nothing

Inxeba (isiXhosa) [The Wound]

This film was probably not an easy film to make and I can only imagine what it would have taken to get it a proper release at least in South Africa. The subject is controversial and deeply personal to the rituals of a tribe. You can never know how much of truth is gonna be in there vs how much content was added to make the film controversial. Nevertheless, it is a beautiful piece of cinema, something very different that we have been used to seeing. Xolani is an isolated factory worker. He takes a break from work to go into the mountains to mentor a city boy for his initiation. Initiation is the act of circumcision thereby welcoming the boys to manhood. This young boy is Kwanda, and Xolani is chosen as a caregiver for him because he has the temperament to deal with “city initiates”, known to be “softer” than their country counterparts. Kwanda is a rebel, who questions age old customs and the gathering of men. The initiation is also an opportunity for Xolani to meet up with his long