In 1961, Dirk Bogarde played a closeted London barrister fighting blackmail in Victim. In 2017, Moonlight won best picture. Between those milestones, gay cinema found room for farce, first love, political organizing and gloriously difficult people. These 29 films make a good place to start, whether you want to explore that history or settle on something for tonight.
For a first pick, try Moonlight for an intimate coming-of-age story, The Birdcage for farce or Weekend for a romance built around conversation. The list below moves through film history, with content notes to help you choose.
Most of these films center gay and bi men. Paris Is Burning and Hedwig and the Angry Inch also belong to a broader queer and gender-diverse film history; their subjects should not all be labeled gay men. For women-loving-women stories, see our lesbian and sapphic movie guide. Streaming homes change, so check current availability in your country.
Gay Movies List at a Glance: Year and Director
| Film | Year | Director |
|---|---|---|
| Victim | 1961 | Basil Dearden |
| The Boys in the Band | 1970 | William Friedkin |
| Maurice | 1987 | James Ivory |
| Torch Song Trilogy | 1988 | Paul Bogart |
| Longtime Companion | 1990 | Norman René |
| Paris Is Burning | 1990 | Jennie Livingston |
| My Own Private Idaho | 1991 | Gus Van Sant |
| Philadelphia | 1993 | Jonathan Demme |
| Beautiful Thing | 1996 | Hettie MacDonald |
| The Birdcage | 1996 | Mike Nichols |
| Happy Together | 1997 | Wong Kar-wai |
| Get Real | 1998 | Simon Shore |
| Hedwig and the Angry Inch | 2001 | John Cameron Mitchell |
| Brokeback Mountain | 2005 | Ang Lee |
| Milk | 2008 | Gus Van Sant |
| A Single Man | 2009 | Tom Ford |
| Weekend | 2011 | Andrew Haigh |
| Pride | 2014 | Matthew Warchus |
| Moonlight | 2016 | Barry Jenkins |
| God’s Own Country | 2017 | Francis Lee |
| Call Me by Your Name | 2017 | Luca Guadagnino |
| BPM (Beats per Minute) | 2017 | Robin Campillo |
| Love, Simon | 2018 | Greg Berlanti |
| Fire Island | 2022 | Andrew Ahn |
| Bros | 2022 | Nicholas Stoller |
| All of Us Strangers | 2023 | Andrew Haigh |
| Passages | 2023 | Ira Sachs |
| Queer | 2024 | Luca Guadagnino |
| Pillion | 2025 | Harry Lighton |
Classic Gay Films Before and After Stonewall
‘Victim’ (1961)
Director: Basil Dearden | Stars: Dirk Bogarde, Sylvia Syms, Peter McEnery
Melville Farr is a successful London barrister with a wife, a reputation and a secret. When a young man he once had feelings for is caught up in a blackmail ring, Farr risks everything to expose the blackmailers. The BFI describes the film as a force in the public debate over reform. The 1967 law that followed only partially decriminalized sex between men in England and Wales, with age and privacy restrictions. Content note: suicide and homophobic persecution.
‘The Boys in the Band’ (1970)
Director: William Friedkin | Stars: Kenneth Nelson, Leonard Frey, Cliff Gorman, Peter White
Michael throws a birthday party for his friend Harold in a Manhattan apartment, and the evening curdles once an uninvited straight college friend shows up and the drinks keep coming. Adapted from Mart Crowley’s 1968 play with its original stage cast, it’s bitchy, hilarious and painful, sometimes in the same line. Some viewers find its self-loathing hard to sit through. That’s part of its value.
‘Maurice’ (1987)
Director: James Ivory | Stars: James Wilby, Hugh Grant, Rupert Graves
At Cambridge in the early 1900s, Maurice Hall falls for his classmate Clive Durham, who loves him back but chooses a respectable marriage. Maurice is left to figure out whether happiness is even possible for a man like him, until an under-gamekeeper named Alec turns up. Based on E.M. Forster’s novel, published only after his death, it’s lush Merchant Ivory filmmaking with an unusually hopeful heart.
‘Torch Song Trilogy’ (1988)
Director: Paul Bogart | Stars: Harvey Fierstein, Anne Bancroft, Matthew Broderick, Brian Kerwin
Arnold Beckoff is a Jewish drag performer in New York who wants what everyone wants: love, respect and a mother who’ll stop arguing with him. Harvey Fierstein adapted his Tony-winning play and stars as Arnold, delivering one-liners in that gravel voice. Anne Bancroft as his mother is a force of nature. Content note: the film includes a homophobic attack.
Gay Movies From the AIDS Crisis and New Queer Cinema
‘Longtime Companion’ (1990)
Director: Norman René | Stars: Bruce Davison, Campbell Scott, Mary-Louise Parker, Dermot Mulroney
The film opens on July 3, 1981, as friends in New York and on Fire Island read a newspaper report about a rare cancer affecting gay men. Over the following years, the epidemic moves through their lives. Craig Lucas’ screenplay stays with the ordinary business of friendship and care as much as the losses. Bruce Davison’s performance as a man caring for his dying partner is especially moving. Content note: HIV and AIDS, illness and death.
‘Paris Is Burning’ (1990)
Director: Jennie Livingston | Featuring: Pepper LaBeija, Dorian Corey, Willi Ninja, Venus Xtravaganza, Angie Xtravaganza
This documentary takes you inside New York’s ballroom scene of the 1980s, with Black and Latino gay men, trans women and other gender-diverse participants discussing competition, aspiration and the houses that became chosen families. Listen to Dorian Corey explain reading and shade, or watch Willi Ninja describe the art of voguing. The film preserves their voices; it did not invent their culture. The National Film Registry added it in 2016. Content note: racism, poverty and the death of a participant.
‘My Own Private Idaho’ (1991)
Director: Gus Van Sant | Stars: River Phoenix, Keanu Reeves
Mike, a young sex worker with narcolepsy, is searching for his mother. Scott is the mayor’s son, passing time on the streets before his inheritance arrives. Their trip from Portland to Idaho and Italy folds Shakespeare into a story about money, abandonment and unreturned love. River Phoenix’s performance gives the film its vulnerable center. Content note: sex work and drug use.
‘Philadelphia’ (1993)
Director: Jonathan Demme | Stars: Tom Hanks, Denzel Washington, Antonio Banderas
Andrew Beckett, a rising lawyer, is fired from his firm after his bosses discover he has AIDS. He sues, and the only attorney willing to take his case is Joe Miller (Denzel Washington), a homophobe who has to confront his own prejudice. Hanks and Bruce Springsteen’s “Streets of Philadelphia” won the acting and original-song Oscars. Content note: HIV and AIDS, illness and death.
Gay Movies of the ’90s: Comedy, Coming of Age and Cult Classics
‘Beautiful Thing’ (1996)
Director: Hettie MacDonald | Stars: Glen Berry, Scott Neal, Linda Henry
On a southeast London council estate, shy Jamie and his neighbor Ste, who’s escaping a violent home, grow close while Ste takes refuge at Jamie’s home. Jamie’s mother, Sandra, is brassy and fierce. The whole thing is soundtracked by Mama Cass, which is a choice you’ll love. Jonathan Harvey adapted his own play. Content note: domestic violence.
‘The Birdcage’ (1996)
Director: Mike Nichols | Stars: Robin Williams, Nathan Lane, Gene Hackman, Dianne Wiest, Hank Azaria
Armand owns a drag club in South Beach, and his partner, Albert, is its headliner. When Armand’s son gets engaged to the daughter of a conservative senator, the family has to play straight for one dinner. It goes exactly as well as you’d hope. Elaine May wrote the script, adapting the French farce La Cage aux Folles. Nathan Lane is a full meal.
‘Happy Together’ (1997)
Director: Wong Kar-wai | Stars: Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Leslie Cheung
Lai Yiu-fai and Ho Po-wing travel from Hong Kong to Argentina to try, once again, to make their relationship work. They fight, break up, make up and break up again in Buenos Aires, all in Christopher Doyle’s saturated colors. It’s a portrait of a love that’s equal parts addiction and devotion. Wong won best director at Cannes for it.
‘Get Real’ (1998)
Director: Simon Shore | Stars: Ben Silverstone, Brad Gorton
Steven is 16, gay and out to almost no one in his English suburb. When he discovers that John, the school’s golden-boy athlete, is secretly interested in him, the two begin a relationship that John isn’t ready to admit to. It’s funny, warm and honest about how lopsided teen coming out can be. Based on Patrick Wilde’s play. Content note: homophobic bullying.
‘Hedwig and the Angry Inch’ (2001)
Director: John Cameron Mitchell | Stars: John Cameron Mitchell, Michael Pitt, Miriam Shor
Hedwig is an East German rock singer who escaped to America by marrying a U.S. soldier, a deal that required surgery that went badly wrong. Now she plays a chain of seafood restaurants while her ex-protégé, Tommy Gnosis, plays arenas with songs she wrote. Mitchell adapted the stage musical, with music by Stephen Trask. The glam-rock soundtrack is a blast. Hedwig’s gender is complex and the film is often read as a genderqueer story, so it lands differently for different viewers.
Gay Films That Went Mainstream in the 2000s
‘Brokeback Mountain’ (2005)
Director: Ang Lee | Stars: Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Williams, Anne Hathaway
In 1963, two young ranch hands, Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist, are hired to herd sheep on a Wyoming mountain for the summer. What starts there lasts for 20 years, through marriages, kids and long stretches apart. Based on Annie Proulx’s short story, it’s restrained and devastating. Lee won the directing Oscar. Content note: homophobic violence.
‘Milk’ (2008)
Director: Gus Van Sant | Stars: Sean Penn, Emile Hirsch, Josh Brolin, James Franco
Harvey Milk moves to San Francisco, opens a camera shop on Castro Street and becomes one of the first openly gay elected officials in the United States. The film tracks his campaigns and his fight against California’s Proposition 6. Penn and screenwriter Dustin Lance Black won the acting and original-screenplay Oscars. Content note: assassination.
‘A Single Man’ (2009)
Director: Tom Ford | Stars: Colin Firth, Julianne Moore, Matthew Goode, Nicholas Hoult
It’s 1962 in Los Angeles, and George, an English professor, is still grieving his partner, Jim, who died in a car accident months earlier. The film follows one day in George’s life, as he decides whether to keep going. Based on Christopher Isherwood’s novel, it’s Tom Ford’s directing debut and looks like a perfume ad in the best sense. Content note: grief and suicidal thoughts.
Modern Gay Movies That Raised the Bar in the 2010s
‘Weekend’ (2011)
Director: Andrew Haigh | Stars: Tom Cullen, Chris New
Russell picks up Glen at a club in Nottingham on a Friday night. What should be a one-night stand stretches into a weekend of sex, drugs, arguments and conversations about being gay in a straight world. Glen leaves for America on Sunday. The film is small, naturalistic and so honest it almost feels like eavesdropping. Content note: drug use and frank sex.
‘Pride’ (2014)
Director: Matthew Warchus | Stars: Bill Nighy, Imelda Staunton, Dominic West, Paddy Considine, Andrew Scott, Ben Schnetzer, George MacKay
During the 1984 British miners’ strike, a group of London gay and lesbian activists starts raising money for a mining village in Wales. The miners aren’t sure they want the help. Based on the true story of Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners, it’s a rousing, funny crowd-pleaser with plenty of dancing. Content note: HIV and AIDS.
‘Moonlight’ (2016)
Director: Barry Jenkins | Stars: Trevante Rhodes, Ashton Sanders, Alex Hibbert, Mahershala Ali, Naomie Harris, Janelle Monáe, André Holland
Chiron grows up in Miami in three chapters: as a child, a teenager and an adult. Each chapter asks who he’s allowed to be, and the answer keeps changing. A drug dealer becomes a surrogate father, his mother struggles with addiction, and his friend Kevin becomes the one person who sees him. It’s quiet, gorgeous and devastating. It won best picture at the 2017 Oscars. Content note: drug use and bullying.
‘God’s Own Country’ (2017)
Director: Francis Lee | Stars: Josh O’Connor, Alec Secăreanu
Johnny is stuck running his family’s Yorkshire farm, drinking himself numb and having joyless hookups. When Gheorghe, a Romanian migrant worker, arrives for lambing season, Johnny gradually learns that tenderness is an option. The moors are harsh and the dialogue is sparse. Josh O’Connor, now a star, gives a breakout performance. Content note: explicit sex and some xenophobic language.
‘Call Me by Your Name’ (2017)
Director: Luca Guadagnino | Stars: Timothée Chalamet, Armie Hammer, Michael Stuhlbarg
In summer 1983 in northern Italy, 17-year-old Elio develops feelings for Oliver, a graduate student staying with his family. Luca Guadagnino’s adaptation of André Aciman’s novel follows that attachment and the difficult ending of a season. James Ivory, who directed Maurice, won the adapted screenplay Oscar. Content note: the central relationship is between a teenager and an adult, an age and power gap that viewers may wish to consider.
‘BPM (Beats per Minute)’ (2017)
Director: Robin Campillo | Stars: Nahuel Pérez Biscayart, Arnaud Valois, Adèle Haenel
In early-1990s Paris, members of ACT UP Paris storm pharmaceutical offices, argue for hours in meetings and dance in clubs. Sean, an HIV-positive activist, falls for Nathan, a newcomer to the group. Campillo was an ACT UP member himself, and the film has the texture of lived experience. It won the Grand Prix at Cannes. Content note: HIV and AIDS, illness and death.
‘Love, Simon’ (2018)
Director: Greg Berlanti | Stars: Nick Robinson, Katherine Langford, Jennifer Garner, Josh Duhamel
Simon has a great family, great friends and a secret: he’s gay, and he’s been emailing an anonymous classmate known only as Blue. When someone threatens to out him, Simon has to decide how to come out on his own terms. It’s a classic teen movie in every way that counts, and that’s the point. Adapted from Becky Albertalli’s novel.
Recent Gay Movies Worth Watching From the 2020s
‘Fire Island’ (2022)
Director: Andrew Ahn | Stars: Joel Kim Booster, Bowen Yang, Conrad Ricamora, Margaret Cho
Noah and his chosen family head to Fire Island Pines for their annual week of drinks, dancing and bad decisions. Booster wrote the script as a modern take on Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, swapping ballrooms for tea dances and class snobbery for gay status games. Bowen Yang is a sweetheart, and Conrad Ricamora makes a perfect Mr. Darcy. Content note: drug use and sexual content.
‘Bros’ (2022)
Director: Nicholas Stoller | Stars: Billy Eichner, Luke Macfarlane
Bobby is a cynical New York podcaster who’s helping open an LGBTQ+ history museum and doesn’t believe in romance. Aaron is a hot, emotionally unavailable lawyer. The two fall for each other while insisting they won’t. Eichner co-wrote the script, and the jokes about gay dating, apps and politics land fast. Content note: sexual content.
‘All of Us Strangers’ (2023)
Director: Andrew Haigh | Stars: Andrew Scott, Paul Mescal, Jamie Bell, Claire Foy
Adam, a lonely screenwriter, lives in a nearly empty London tower and starts seeing Harry, a neighbor. He also returns to his childhood home, where his long-dead parents appear as they were decades earlier. Andrew Haigh’s film is part ghost story, part love story, and deeply concerned with what Adam never got to tell them. Content note: bereavement, drug use and loneliness.
‘Passages’ (2023)
Director: Ira Sachs | Stars: Franz Rogowski, Ben Whishaw, Adèle Exarchopoulos
Tomas, a self-absorbed film director in Paris, is married to Martin. After a wrap party, Tomas sleeps with Agathe, a schoolteacher, and announces the affair to his husband with alarming enthusiasm. What follows is a messy, funny, frustrating love triangle. Content note: explicit sex.
‘Queer’ (2024)
Director: Luca Guadagnino | Stars: Daniel Craig, Drew Starkey, Jason Schwartzman, Lesley Manville
It’s the 1950s, and William Lee, an American expatriate, drinks his way through Mexico City’s bars until he becomes obsessed with Eugene Allerton, a younger ex-serviceman. Their relationship leads to a trip into South America. Based on William S. Burroughs’s novella, it gives Craig one of his strangest and most vulnerable roles. Content note: drug use and explicit sex.
‘Pillion’ (2025)
Director: Harry Lighton | Stars: Harry Melling, Alexander Skarsgård, Douglas Hodge, Lesley Sharp
Colin is shy and still living with his parents when an encounter with Ray, an aloof biker, draws him into a submissive role in their relationship. The arrangement is strict, and the film lets Colin’s desires and doubts complicate it. Harry Lighton adapted Adam Mars-Jones’ novel Box Hill and won the screenplay prize in Cannes’ 2025 Un Certain Regard section. Content note: BDSM, sexual content and unequal relationship dynamics.
How to Choose Your Next Gay Movie Night Pick
For three very different starting points, try Moonlight, Weekend and The Birdcage: a coming-of-age drama, an intimate indie romance and a farce. For history, pair Victim with Milk or BPM. Want a hopeful romantic ending? Try Maurice, Beautiful Thing, God’s Own Country or Fire Island.
Find more reviews and new releases in Gayety’s movie section.
For earlier film history, UCLA’s restoration of Different from the Others (1919) is a vital companion watch. The surviving German silent film openly challenges the persecution of gay men; it goes well beyond a coded hint of attraction.
Best Gay Movies FAQ
What is the best gay movie of all time?
There is no single answer. Moonlight is a strong starting point for its intimate portrait of a gay Black man growing up in Miami. Happy Together, Brokeback Mountain and Weekend offer very different approaches to love and loneliness.
What was the first gay movie?
The answer depends on the definition and on which films survive. Different from the Others (1919) is an important early feature that openly depicts a gay protagonist and argues against persecution. UCLA has preserved and restored the surviving material.
What gay movie won best picture?
Moonlight, released in 2016, won best picture at the 89th Academy Awards in 2017. Barry Jenkins directed it from a story by Tarell Alvin McCraney.
What are good gay coming-of-age movies?
Beautiful Thing, Get Real, Love, Simon and Moonlight are good starting points, with very different settings and tones. Call Me by Your Name is another notable film, with an adult-teen relationship that merits a content note.
Are there gay romantic comedies with happy endings?
Yes. Try Fire Island, Bros or Beautiful Thing. Maurice and God’s Own Country are dramas rather than romantic comedies, but also offer hopeful endings for their couples.
