When stand-up comedian, writer, and actor Joel Kim Booster had the genius idea to rework Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice as a modern-day rom-com set on Fire Island centering queer Asian American characters, he turned to Andrew Ahn to direct his screenplay. The queer Korean American filmmaker caught the attention of critics and the entertainment... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: Swan Song writer-director Todd Stephens “I wanted to cast a queer actor to play this queer part”
Filmmaker Todd Stephens returns to his hometown of Sandusky, following 1998's Edge of Seventeen and 2001's Gypsy 83, to complete his Ohio trilogy with Swan Song, "an instant queer classic" (TheQueer Review), now playing in US theaters. The bittersweet comedy which premiered at SWXW Online 2021, stars the legendary Udo Kier as Mister Pat, a... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: Jeffrey Friedman on his Oscar-winning decades-long filmmaking partnership with Rob Epstein
This Pride Month the Criterion Channel is showcasing the Oscar-winning work of filmmakers Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman with the eight film collection, Pride and Protest. In 1977, Friedman, who was working as an assistant editor in New York, was struck by the power of queer filmmakers putting queer lives on screen when he encountered... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: filmmaker John Berardo on his new horror Initiation “we put men in vulnerable half naked positions because the slasher genre does that to women”
If you're a fan of the slasher movies of the 70s and 80s like Black Christmas and The Slumber Party Massacre, or their post-modern dark comedy incarnations like Scream, you'll likely appreciate the edgy, contemporary social media fueled spin that filmmaker John Berardo puts on the subgenre with his gripping and gruesome debut feature Initiation.... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: filmmaker Samuel Van Grinsven on his seductive queer coming-of-age tale Sequin in a Blue Room
Writer-director Samuel Van Grinsven’s seductive, visually striking debut feature, Sequin in a Blue is the compelling story of Sequin (Conor Leach) a gay teenager exploring his burgeoning sexuality in the digital age, who is obsessed with an anonymous hookup app and the no-strings encounters he arranges through it. When he finds his way into the... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: queer Mexican filmmaker Bruno Santamaría on his delicate portrait of gender expression Things We Dare Not Do “it was a very personal movie & it changed my life”
Selected to play at Mexico's cancelled Guadalajara Film Festival in March, queer director, cinematographer and co-editor Bruno Santamaría's hauntingly beautiful Things We Dare Not Do/Cosas que no hacemos finally premiered in the World Showcase section at the 2020 Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, which ran online from May 28th until June 6th. Following his... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: End of the Century Director Lucio Castro
Lucio Catro's Barcelona summer set sensual gay romance End of the Century had its world premiere at The Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center's New Directors/New Films festival earlier this year. It went on to win best Argentinian film at the Beunos Aires Film Festival, before playing at LA's Outfest... Continue Reading →