Johnson County Community College LibGuides - Gay and Lesbian Film Guide

Feature Films

And the Band Played On (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 A5435
This film follows the struggle of a handful of strong-willed men and women who took on the fight to save lives in the face of a mysterious illness now called AIDS.
Another Country (Great Britain)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 A6157
An elderly, exiled British spy remembers his days at an English boarding school in the 1930s. In school, he fell in love with a male classmate, explored his homosexuality and was exposed to Marxist ideas, both contributing to his activities as a spy.
As Good as it Gets (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 A7983
Melvin Udall, a cranky, bigoted, obsessive-compulsive writer, finds his life turned upside down when neighboring gay artist Simon is hospitalized and his dog is entrusted to Melvin. In addition, Carol, the only waitress who will tolerate him, must leave work to care for her sick son, making it impossible for Melvin to eat breakfast.
Beautiful Thing (Great Britain)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 B3847
Set in London's lower class suburbs, this is the story of a teenager who has discovered that he's gay and his love for another teenager who lives next door.
Before Night Falls (Cuba, USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 B4155
This film dramatizes the life of noted Cuban author Reinaldo Arenas, from childhood in Cuba to his death in New York City. His writings and homosexuality get him in trouble with Castro's Cuba and he spends two years in prison before leaving for the United States.
Bent (USA, Germany)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 B4751
Pursued and captured by the Nazis because he is gay, Max is placed in a concentration camp where he pretends to be Jewish to avoid even worse persecution. There he meets another gay prisoner and learns a life-altering lesson about human love.
Billy Elliot (Great Britain)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 B5994
Eleven-year-old miner's son Billy Elliot is on his way to boxing lessons when he stumbles upon a ballet class. Billy secretly joins the class, knowing that his blue-collar family would never understand.
Boys Don't Cry (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 B7933
A transgendered youth starts living as a man, and assumes the name Brandon Teena. He moves to a tiny Nebraska town and begins making new friends under his new identity. All goes well until his new friends discover his secret. Based on a true story about hope, fear, and the courage it takes to be yourself.
Cabaret (USA, Germany)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 C1127
An egocentric American girl dreams of becoming a star while working in a third-rate Berlin cabaret as the Nazis come into power, persecuting those around her.
Carrington (Great Britain)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 C3184
This film portrays the life of Dora Carrington, the Victorian Era painter whose passionate life created one of England's greatest scandals. Unable to possess the one man she loves, Lytton Strachey, Carrington embarks on a long string of loveless sexual encounters.
De-Lovely (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 D3625
This original musical portrait of American composer Cole Porter is filled with his unforgettable songs. Porter looks back on his life as if it were one of his spectacular stage shows, with the people and events of his life becoming the actors and actions onstage. Through elaborate production numbers and popular hits, Porter's elegant, excessive past comes to light - including his deeply complicated relationship with his wife, Linda Lee Porter, who was his inspiration.
Doing Time on Maple Drive (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 D6575
Phil Carter and his devoted wife Lisa are the proud but domineering parents of a near-perfect family that has gathered to celebrate the upcoming marriage of its youngest son. But soon, the gathering turns to confrontation as secrets of each of the Carters' three children are revealed. Phil and Lisa are forced to take a closer look at reality and at the same time, keep their family from falling apart.
Edge of Seventeen (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 E234
A gay teen finds out who he is and what he wants, who his friends are, and who loves him, in this autobiographical tale set in Middle America in the summer of 1984. Eric gets a summer job at an amusement park where he meets Rod. A puppy-love infatuation begins as Eric realizes that if he's falling in love with a male, he must be gay.
Flawless (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 F5915
An ex-cop suffers a stroke and is paralyzed and unable to speak clearly. On the advice of his doctor, he seeks voice lessons from a musically inclined neighbor, a female impersonator whom he vehemently dislikes.
Get Real (Great Britain)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 G3945
There's no time quite as awkward as adolescence. Between the expectations of parents, the constant scrutiny of peers, and one's own raging hormones, something's got to give. And if, like Steven Carter, you also happen to be gay, navigating your way through adolescence can be like hiking through a minefield.
Gods and Monsters (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 G5891
It's 1957, and Hollywood horror director James Whale's heyday as the director of "Frankenstein," "Bride of Frankenstein" and "The Invisible Man" is long behind him. Retired and a semi-recluse, he lives his days accompanied only by images from his past. When his dour housekeeper Hannah hires handsome young gardener Clayton Boone, the gay director and the simple yardman develop an unlikely friendship.
Jeffrey (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 J463
Disenchanted with the not-so-romantic side of safe sex, sweet, single and obsessive Jeffrey vows to become completely celibate. No sooner has he sworn off sex than he meets hunky, sensitive Steve. But just as passion starts to ignite, Steve reveals some earth-shattering information, leaving Jeffrey to choose between losing the man of his dreams or taking a risk on what might be true love.
Kiss of the Spider Woman (USA, Argentina)
Call Number: [VHS] 791.43 K617
In a prison cell somewhere in Latin America, Molina and Valentin have only one thing in common-- they are both victims of society. This is the complex story of the relationship that develops between two men with radically different perspectives on life.
La Cage aux Folles (France)
Call Number: [VHS] 791.43 C1313
This farce involves a flamboyant homosexual couple's attempt to appear to be conventional parents in front of the prospective in-laws of the son of one of the men. In French with English subtitles.
Laramie Project (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 L3183
In October 1998, 21-year-old Matthew Shepard was found savagely beaten, tied to a fence and left to die in Laramie, Wyoming. This film is a dramatization of a town forced to confront itself in the reflective glare of the national spotlight, responding with love, anger, sympathy, support and defiance.
Latter Days (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 L3644
In this provocative film, a party animal develops a relationship with a young Mormon missionary.
Longtime Companion
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 L8573
This drama concerning the AIDS crisis focuses on a small group of friends from the time they first read about AIDS in the New York Times through the 1980's as they face the impact of the disease on themselves and their friends.
Love! Valour! Compassion! (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 L8978
Based on the play by Terrence McNally, the film follows eight gay men, longtime friends, who spend summer holiday weekends together at a beach house.
Ma Vie en Rose (France)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 M1117
Ludovic is waiting for a miracle. With six-year-old certainty, he believes he was meant to be a little girl and that the mistake will soon be corrected. But where he expects the miraculous, Ludo finds only rejection, isolation and guilt--as the intense reactions of family, friends, and neighbors strip away every innocent lace and bauble.
Mambo Italiano (Canada)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 M2633
Fifty years ago, Gino and Maria came to Canada, and never quite recovered. Now, their son Angelo breaks the news that he wants to quit his job and he's in love with his best friend. Tradition is undone, and family is going to take on a whole new meaning.
Maurice (Great Britain)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 M4548
E.M. Forrester's story of two Edwardian-era Cambridge graduates that fall in love, but must abide by British society's strict norms regarding homosexuality.
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 M6296
When the affable host of an elegant Christmas party shoots a man to death, his friends discover secrets that make them less eager to help with his courtroom defense.
Philadelphia (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 P5441
This is the story of two competing lawyers who join together to sue a prestigious Philadelphia law firm when the firm fires one of them because he has AIDS.
Priest (Great Britain)
Call Number: [VHS] 791.43 P9495
The deeply held religious convictions of an idealistic young priest are challenged when he must face extraordinary events within his own congregation. Soon, he is forced to make the impossible choice between keeping the faith and exposing the truth.
Save Me Mythgarden
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 S2664
Mark is a young gay man who is addicted to sex and drugs. When he hits bottom, his concerned brother checks him into a Christian retreat in the New Mexico desert. Gayle and Ted are the compassionate husband and wife team who run the retreat. They have made it their mission to cure young men of their 'gay affliction' through spiritual guidance. Mark bonds with fellow resident Scott and their friendship evolves, they are forced to confront their true selves.
Strawberry and Chocolate (Cuba)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 S9132
In this Cuban film, a young college kid meets a writer and a passionate woman who teach him the things that aren't taught in school. In Spanish with English subtitles.
Taboo (Japan)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 T1143
A handsome new recruit, Kano, causes sexual tension in a traditional samurai militia group called Shinsengumi in Kyoto, at the end of the Shogunate era in Japan.
The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (Australia)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 A2447
With a contract to perform a drag show way out in the Australian desert, Tick, Adam, and Ralph each has his own reason for wanting to leave the safety of Sydney. Christening their battered pink tour bus "Priscilla," the trio heads for the outback and into crazy adventures in even crazier outfits.
The Birdcage (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 B6182
The story of a middle-aged gay couple's comic encounter with a self-righteously straight and conservative family: Armand and Albert reluctantly accept young Val's intention to marry the daughter of a conservative Senator, but when the fianc�e�s family comes to visit, the whole household is turned upside down. This is the American version of La Cage aux Folles.
The Closet (France)
Call Number: [VHS] 791.43 C6457
Fran�ois Pignon, a very bland sort of man who works as an accountant in a condom factory, is about to be fired. His new neighbor comes up with an idea to prevent such a thing from happening: he creates photos and then spreads the rumor that Fran�ois is gay so that the factory management might be afraid they'll be sued for sexual discrimination. Of course, nothing happens as it should, but the changes in Fran�ois Pignon's life - and other people's too - is drastic! In French with English subtitles.
The Crying Game (Great Britain, Ireland)
Call Number: [VHS] 791.43 C95794
This is a haunting, humorous and shocking romantic thriller about Irish terrorists, their hostage and the hostage's exotic girlfriend who isn�t what she seems to be.
The Dresser (Great Britain)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 D7737
Sir, a grandiloquent old man of the theater, has given his soul to his career, but his tyrannical rule over the company is now beginning to crack under the strain of age and illness as he prepares for his two hundred twenty-seventh performance of King Lear. Sir's dedicated dresser, Norman, submits to Sir's frequently unreasonable demands, tends to his health, and reminds him of what role he is currently playing.
The Hours (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 H8413
In 1929, Virginia Woolf is starting to write her novel, 'Mrs. Dalloway, ' under the care of doctors and family. In 1951, Laura Brown is planning for her husband's birthday, but is preoccupied with reading Woolf's novel. In 2001, Clarrisa Vaughn is planning an award party for her friend, an author dying of AIDS. Taking place over one day, all three stories are interconnected with the novel: one is writing it, one is reading it, and one is living it.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 R6844
In this mixture of fantastical rock opera and horror movie spoof, a couple of ordinary kids have car trouble one dark and rainy night and knock on the door of a looming gothic mansion. They are stunned to learn that they have stumbled into an ongoing convention of kinky characters, hosted by Dr. Frank-N-Furter, a mad scientist from the planet Transsexual.
The Wedding Banquet (USA, Taiwan)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 W3882
In New York, the Taiwanese half of a gay couple hopes to end his parents' matchmaking by announcing that he's engaged. What he doesn't count on is that they'll fly in to meet the bride and plan the nuptials!
To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 T6278
En route from New York City to Hollywood for a drag queen beauty pageant, Noxeema, Vida and Chi Chi are stranded in a tiny Midwestern town when their 1967 Cadillac breaks down. When their glitz and glamour wake up the sleepy local citizens, the stage is set for an outrageously funny weekend.
Torch Song Trilogy (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 T6766
Based on a play by Harvey Fierstein, this film chronicles a gay man in New York who is searching for love, respect, and tradition in a world that seems not especially made for him.
Total Eclipse (France, USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 T7173
Paul Verlaine, a writer, is torn between his growing infatuation with the genius poet Arthur Rimbaud and the domestic demands of his patient wife.
Victor Victoria (USA, France)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 V6454
A starving singer in Depression-era Paris is convinced by an equally hapless performer that she may have more luck on the transvestite circuit if she can first pass herself off as a man.
Wilde (Great Britain)
Call Number: [DVD] 791.43 W6712
Notorious poet and playwright Oscar Wilde devours all that life has to offer, but there's only so much that late Victorian England will tolerate. As Wilde delves into a taboo world of unrealized homosexual desire, his life rapidly becomes a turbulent charade. He cannot escape the repercussions wrought by a "pure" society, nor will he hide in shame for being true to his nature.

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Documentaries

After Stonewall: From the Riots to the Millennium
Call Number: [DVD] 306.76 A2585
In 1969, the police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York City's Greenwich Village, leading to three nights of rioting by the city's gay community. With this outpouring of courage and unity the Gay Liberation Movement had begun. The film chronicles the history of lesbian and gay life from the riots at Stonewall to the end of the century. It captures the hard work, struggles, tragic defeats and exciting victories experienced since then. It explores how AIDS literally changed the direction of the movement.
Common Threads Stories from the Quilt
Call Number: [DVD] 362.19 C7343
This is the story of the AIDS Memorial Quilt established by the San Francisco NAMES Project Foundation in 1987 to commemorate the lives lost to AIDS. From the thousands memorialized in the quilt, profiles five individuals--including a recovered IV drug user, a former Olympic decathlon star and a boy with hemophilia--whose stories reflect the diversity and common tragedy of those who have died from AIDS. The film celebrates their unique personalities and achievements, interweaving these personal histories with a chronology of the epidemic's development and the negligence of the government.
Gay Republicans (USA)
Call Number: [DVD] 306.76 G2856
This documentary follows a handful of Log Cabin members on their different paths to 'Decision 2004.' A Stereotype shattering, gut wrenching portrait of an organization in turmoil that is incisive, moving, disturbing and humorous.
I Can't Marry You
Call Number: [DVD] 306.84 I153
This educational film explores the real life stories of 20 long term gay and lesbian couples, and reveals the obstacles they encounter due to not being able to marry in the U.S. It is hosted by Betty DeGeneres, mother of comedian, Ellen DeGeneres.
Keep the River on your Right a Modern Cannibal Tale
Call Number: [DVD] 980.1 K265
The film discusses the life of anthropologist and gay activist, Tobias Schneebaum, and the time he spent among cannibalistic tribes in the 1960s.
Pandemic Facing Aids
Call Number: [DVD] 362.19 P1893
Directed by award-winning filmmaker Rory Kennedy ("American Hollow," "A Boy's Life"), this theatrical version of the HBO series takes us from Uganda to India, Brazil, Thailand, and Russia to reveal five remarkable stories of people who have been touched by AIDS. From James, a seven-year-old Ugandan orphan who is taking care of his little sister Jessica, to Lek, a former sex worker in Thailand, these stories are both heartbreaking and uplifting. Ultimately, Pandemic is a film about hope, not defeat.
Paragraph 175
Call Number: [DVD] 305.9 P2224
Paragraph 175 interviews the few surviving homosexuals who endured unspeakable horrors under the Nazi regime. Through the testimonies of these men and woman, an untold chapter of the Holocaust unfolds. It is extremely painful for these survivors to recall what they went through, and their expressive silences speak volumes.
Silverlake Life - the View from Here
Call Number: [DVD] 362.19 S5876
This extraordinary video is diary of living with AIDS. Told with guts and humor by longtime companions Tom Joslin and Mark Massi, this powerful documentary celebrates the human spirit while capturing the emotional challenges of living with a fatal illness.
The Brandon Teena Story
Call Number: [DVD] 364.1 B8195
This is a documentary film about Brandon Teena, who arrived in rural Falls City, Nebraska, in 1993 where he finds some new friends. Three weeks later he is brutally raped and beaten by friends who discover that he is actually a woman. A week later the same two men murder Teena along with two other people. This is a tale of Brandon's coming of age struggle with identity and how his gender ambiguity induced feelings of betrayal, confusion and hostility among residents of a town in America's heartland.
The Celluloid Closet
Call Number: [DVD] 302.234 C3935
Assembling footage from over 120 films, the movie shows the changing face of cinema homosexuality from cruel stereotypes to covert love to the activist cinema of the 1990s. Many actors, writers and commentators provide anecdotes regarding the history of the role of gay men and lesbians on the silver screen.
The Times of Harvey Milk
Call Number: [DVD] 323.3 T5833
This is a cinematic portrait of the life and career of Harvey Milk, a charismatic grass-roots activist, and one of the first avowed homosexuals elected to political office. Through television news footage and interviews, the film follows him from his early days as a Castro Street businessman to his murder, along with San Francisco Mayor George Moscone, in 1978. It also relates these events to the ongoing movement for gay rights in the United States.