20 Of The Best Gay Films Ever Made

A unique and refreshing collection of gay films submitted by our readers.  They’re all highly entertaining and thought-provoking. Some have been nominated for Oscars, are critically acclaimed or have won major film festivals.  Many of the films took major risks and have depicted gay men in some nontraditional ways.

#1  Torch Song Trilogy (1988) Rotten Tomatoes Score 74% (Contributed by Michael Mares)

Urban comedy-drama spanning nine years in the life of a gay man in New York, centering around the loves in his life, his stormy relationship with his mother, and his hopes to adopt a son.

Where to watch: Purchase on Amazon, YouTube

#2  Jeffrey (1995) Rotten Tomatoes Score 68% (Contributed by Michael Mares)

Based on a popular Broadway play, this comedy chronicles the experiences that made formerly-promiscuous homosexual Jeffrey take a vow of celibacy. After having several sexual disasters, Jeffrey decides to not have sex again. Unfortunately, no sooner does he take his vow than he meets the man of his dreams.

Where to watch: Fandango, Apple TV, VUDU

#3  1985 (2018)  Rotten Tomatoes Score 97% (Contributed by jerry)

Having been gone for three years, closeted advertising executive Adrian (Cory Michael Smith, “Gotham”) returns to his Texas hometown for the holidays during the first wave of the AIDS crisis. Burdened with an unspeakable tragedy in New York City, Adrian looks to reconnect with his preteen brother Andrew (Aidan Langford) while navigating his relationship with religious parents Eileen (Academy Award Nominee Virginia Madsen) and Dale (Golden Globe Award Winner Michael Chiklis). When he reaches out to his estranged childhood friend Carly (Jamie Chung, “The Gifted”), their unresolved issues force Adrian to confront an uncertain future that will significantly alter the lives of those around him. Shot on black-and-white super 16mm film, “1985” takes a unique look at a pivotal moment in American history through the prism of empathy, love and family.

Where to watch: Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play

#4  FRESA Y CHOCOLATE (1984) Rotten Tomatoes Score 81%  (Contributed by JOSUE)

This Oscar nominated film. Diego, a cultivated, apolitical, sceptical young artist living in Havana initiates a friendship with fiercely communist homophobe David with the intention of seducing him. David, knowing this, allows the relationship to build so he can spy on a person he sees as aberrant and dangerous to the communist cause. Despite their conflicting sexualities and political ideologies the two slowly build a relationship out of their differences, proving that camaraderie and friendship can overcome the most divisive superficialities.

Where to watch: Netflix, Amazon

#5  Parting Glances (1986) Rotten Tomatoes Score 86% (Contributed by Rob K)

As Robert (John Bolger), a successful young gay man, prepares to leave New York City for an extended work assignment abroad, his boyfriend, Michael (Richard Ganoung), must contend with his imminent absence and its effect on their relationship. Meanwhile, Michael also cares for his ex-lover, Nick (Steve Buscemi), who is struggling with HIV. At a going-away party for Robert, emotions run high as the men and their friends deal with their changing realities.

Where to watch: Tubi

#6  Tomboy (2011)  Rotten Tomatoes Score 97%  (Contributed by Rob K) 

A French family with two daughters, 10-year-old Laure and 6-year-old Jeanne, moves to a new neighborhood during the summer holidays. With her Jean Seberg haircut and tomboy ways, Laure is immediately mistaken for a boy by the local kids and passes herself off as Michael. Filmmaker Céline Sciamma brings a light and charming touch to this drama of childhood gender confusion. Zoe Heran as Laure/Michael and Malonn Levanna as Jeanne are nothing less than brilliant. This is a relationship movie: relationships between children, and the even more complicated one between one’s heart and body. — (C) Rocket Releasing

Where to watch: Amazon Prime, Netflix

#7  Toy Boy (TV Series 2019) (Contributed  by Dannyboi2)

Dannyboi2 says, I’m loving Toy Boy On Netflix – Perfect escapism with sexy pretty people, intrigue a lo Spanish Soap. I promise you’ll love the bad acting, but it has some touching moments that you’ll identify as very LGBTQ friendly. After seven years in a Málaga prison, a male stripper is released pending retrial and sets out to prove his lover framed him for her husband’s murder.

Where to watch: Netflix

#8  Boy Erased (2018) Rotten Tomatoes Score 81% (Contributed by Kevin1985) 

Jared Eamons, the son of a small-town Baptist pastor, must overcome the fallout after being outed as gay to his parents. His father and mother struggle to reconcile their love for their son with their beliefs. Fearing a loss of family, friends and community, Jared is pressured into attending a conversion therapy program. While there, Jared comes into conflict with its leader and begins his journey to finding his own voice and accepting his true self.

Where to Watch: YouTube, Amazon Prime, Google Play

#9  All About My Mother (1999)  Rotten Tomatoes Score 98% (Contributed by Rick Crane)

Manuela (Cecilia Roth) is a single mother who has raised her son, Esteban (Eloy Azorín), to adulthood on her own and has come to emotionally depend on him. One night, Manuela and Esteban take in a production of A Streetcar Named Desire; after the show, Esteban is struck and killed by a passing motorist as he dashes into the street to get an autograph from Huma Rojo (Marisa Paredes), who played Blanche. Emotionally devastated, Manuela relocates to Barcelona in hopes of finding her ex-husband (and Esteban’s father), who is now working as a female impersonator. Manuela becomes reacquainted with old friend La Agrado (Antonia San Juan), a transsexual, and is introduced to Sister Rosa (Penélope Cruz), a good-hearted nun who has to contend with her considerably more cynical mother (Rosa María Sardà). While looking for work, Manuela becomes acquainted with Huma Rojo. Huma, on the other hand, has troubles of her own, most involving her drug-addicted significant other, Nina (Candela Peña). 

Where to watch: Fandango, Prime Video, Apple TV, VUDU

#10  My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)  Rotten Tomatoes Score 97% (Contributed by Rick Crane)

In a seedy corner of London, Omar (Gordon Warnecke), a young Pakistani, is given a run-down laundromat by his uncle (Saeed Jaffrey), who hopes to turn it into a successful business. Soon after, Omar is attacked by a group of racist punks, but defuses the situation when he realizes their leader is his former lover, Johnny (Daniel Day-Lewis). The men resume their relationship and rehabilitate the laundromat together, but various social forces threaten to compromise their success.

Where to watch: Fandango, Prime Video, Apple TV, VUDU

#11  Before Night Falls (2001)  Rotten Tomatoes Score 73% (Contributed by Rick Crane)

This is the story of Cuban poet and novelist Reinaldo Arenas. Raised in the Oriente Province of Cuba in the 1940s, Arenas began his life-long love of the sea and water. Leaving home as a young adolescent, he moves to Havana where he finds himself swept up in the revolutionary spirit and joins a circle of writers and artists. His first novel, “Singing from the Well,” is published in Cuba, but as Castro’s oppressive regime gathers force, Arenas’ homosexuality and political writing make him a target. After being falsely accused of molestation, Arenas is arrested and imprisoned at El Morro. Eventually released from prison after dehumanizing treatment, Arenas flees Cuba in the 1980 Mariel Harbor boatlift. After moving to New York with his friend Lazaro Gomez Carilles, Arenas’ hopes for a new life are destroyed by AIDS, and he dies in 1993, at the age of 45.

Where to watch: Fandango, Prime Video, Apple TV, VUDU

#12  Steel Magnolias (1989) Rotten Tomatoes Score 70% (Contributed by Michael Mares)

Six women come together in this hilarious and heartwarming story of life, love and loss in a small Louisiana parish. At the center of the group is Shelby Eatenton, newly married and joyfully pregnant, despite the fact that her diabetes could make childbirth life-threatening. Terrified and angry at the possibility of losing her only daughter, M’Lynn Eatenton looks to her four closest friends for strength and laughter as she battled her deepest fear of death in order to join Shelby in celebrating the miracle of new life.

Where to watch: Netflix, Prime Video

#13  Flawless Rotten Tomatoes Score 70% (Contributed by Michael Mares)

Walt Koontz is a retired security guard, ultraconservative and proud of it, living in New York City’s Lower East Side. Late one night, while trying to help a neighbor in trouble, Walt suffers a stroke which leaves him with partial paralysis. Refusing to leave his apartment for therapy, Walt very reluctantly agrees to a rehabilitative program that includes singing lessons with a performer who lives upstairs — a street-tough drag queen named Rusty.

Where to watch: Netflix, Prime Video

#14  A Very Natural Thing (1974) Rotten Tomatoes Score N/A (Contributed by Tom Negran)

A Very Natural Thing is a 1974 film directed by Christopher Larkin and starring Robert Joel, Curt Gareth, Bo White, Anthony McKay, and Marilyn Meyers. The plot concerns a gay man named David who leaves a monastery to become a public school teacher by day, while looking for true love in a gay bar by night. This drama takes a frank look at the ways in which a homosexual teen deals with his life after his lover abandons him. One of the young man’s teachers, himself a gay man, understands his situation, but unfortunately, cannot openly help him lest he lose his job and social standing.

Where to watch: Amazon Prime, YouTube, Google Play

#15  The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994) Rotten Tomatoes Score 95% (Contributed by Rick Crane)

The usually menacing British actor Terence Stamp does a complete turnaround as Bernadette, an aging transsexual who tours the backwaters of Australia with her stage partners, Mitzi (Hugo Weaving) and Adam/Felicia (Guy Pearce). Their act, well-known in Sydney, involves wearing lots of makeup and gowns and lip-synching to records, but Bernadette is getting a bit tired of it all and is also haunted by the bizarre death of an old loved one. Nevertheless, when Mitzi and Felicia get an offer to perform in the remote town of Alice Springs at a casino, Bernadette decides to tag along. The threesome ventures into the outback with Priscilla, a lavender-colored school bus that doubles as dressing room and home on the road. Along the way, the act encounters any number of strange characters, as well as incidents of homophobia, while Bernadette becomes increasingly concerned about the path her life has taken. 

Where to watch: Fandango, Prime Video, Apple TV, VUDU

#16  Maurice (1987)  Rotten Tomatoes Score 90% (Contributed by Rick Crane)

Set against the stifling conformity of pre-World War I English society, E.M. Forster’s Maurice is a story of coming to terms with one’s sexuality and identity in the face of disapproval and misunderstanding. Maurice Hall and Clive Durham find themselves falling in love at Cambridge. In a time when homosexuality is punishable by imprisonment, the two must keep their feelings for one another a complete secret. After a friend is arrested and disgraced for “the unspeakable vice of the Greeks,” Clive abandons his forbidden love and marries a young woman. Maurice, however, struggles with his identity and self-confidence, seeking the help of a hypnotist to rid himself of his undeniable urges. But while staying with Clive and his shallow wife, Anne, Maurice is seduced by the affectionate and yearning servant Alec Scudder, an event that brings about profound changes in Maurice’s life and outlook.

Where to watch: Fandango, Prive Video, Apple TV, VUDU

#17  Pride (2014)  IMDB Score 7.8/10 (Contributed by Rick Crane)

In 1984 20 year old closet gay Joe hesitantly arrives in London from Bromley for his first Gay Pride march and is taken under the collective wing of a group of gay men and Lesbian Steph, who meet at flamboyant Jonathan and his Welsh partner Gethin’s Soho bookshop. Not only are gays being threatened by Thatcher but the miners are on strike in response to her pit closures and Northern Irish activist Mark Ashton believes gays and miners should show solidarity. Almost by accident a mini-bus full of gays find themselves in the Welsh village of Onllwyn in the Dulais valley and through their sincere fund raising and Jonathan’s nifty disco moves persuade most of the community that they are on the same side. When a bigot tries to sabotage the partnership with a tabloid smear Mark turns it back on her with a hugely successful benefit concert to which most of the villagers, now thoroughly in tune with their gay friends, turn up. 

Where to watch Amazon Prime, Vudu, YouTube, iTunes, Google Play

#18  The Wedding Banquet  Rotten Tomatoes Score 96% (Contributed by Rick Crane)

A gay New Yorker stages a marriage of convenience with a young woman to satisfy his traditional Taiwanese family, but the wedding becomes a major inconvenience when his parents fly in for the ceremony. Director Ang Lee came to international prominence with this warm-hearted comedy, which centers on the farcical confusion that emerges from this deception. Gao Wai Tung (Winston Chao) has never shared the truth about his sexuality with his family, and hopes to disguise his long-term relationship with his lover Simon by marrying Wei-Wei, a young artist who’s only it for the green card. But Wai Tung’s parents refuse to let him off the hook easily, showing up to plan a massive wedding banquet. Indeed, much of the film’s comedy springs from the contrast between the sheer lavishness of the parents’ plans and the sham nature of the wedding. Naturally, the titular party spins out of control, leading to a series of events that threatens all of Wai Tung’s relationships. ~ Judd Blaise, Rovi

Where to watch: Netflix, VUDU

#19  Making Love (1982) Rotten Tomatoes Score 35% (Contributed by Jesup007)

The first wide-release studio film with a homosexual relationship at its center (and for decades, the last). Making Love follows Michael Ontkean’s Zack, who is married to Claire (Kate Jackson) but exploring his homosexuality with Harry Hamlin’s Bart. It’s not a perfect film, but it took a giant risk, and gives us a rare snapshot of Los Angeles’ gay life in the moment just before AIDS.

Where to watch: Amazon

#20  Beginners (2010) Rotten Tomatoes Score 85% (Submitted by Rob K)

Mike Mills’s sweet 2010 film concerns a Los Angeles artist, played by Ewan MacGregor, building a relationship with his newly-out father (Christopher Plummer) in the last year of the older man’s life. Beginners earned Plummer an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor and features a talking Jack Russell terrier. In short, it’s pretty much perfect. 

Where to watch: Primve Video, Fandango, Vudu, Apple TV, YouTube

Let’s keep the list going. What’s your favorite movie?

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