Real love for LGBTQ couples--the kind that lasts through the end credits, anyway--can prove difficult to find in the movies. Perhaps that helps these particular couples stand out. All find love by the time the movie ends, and get a heartwarming chance to stroll off into the sunset together.
And hey, when it comes to coupling who doesn't like a happy ending?
Real love for LGBTQ couples–the kind that lasts through the end credits, anyway–can prove difficult to find in the movies. Perhaps that helps these particular couples stand out. All find love by the time the movie ends, and get a heartwarming chance to stroll off into the sunset together.
And hey, when it comes to coupling who doesn’t like a happy ending?
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Albert & Armand, The Birdcage
We have to wonder how many viewers back in 1996—or for that matter, even today—realized that The Birdcage, at its core, is a film about a bickering married couple. As Albert, the flamboyant drag queen, and Armand, the snarky cheapskate, Nathan Lane and Robin Williams still have us in stitches. When the two sit together on a park bench and discuss palimony, or sniffle at the wedding of their son, we can’t help but sigh. Prickly as they are, theirs is a relationship of true love.
Something about Love, Simon warms our hearts, and it probably has something to do with the love-under-your-nose trope employed in the climax of the movie. We can’t, in good conscience, give the ending away, nor can we disclose the true identity of Blue, Simon’s online crush. Still, when the film finally reveals all, we swoon at the sight of Simon & Blue smooching on a Ferris wheel—an experience so many of us craved as teens, but will sadly never have.
Bound, as directed by the Wachowski Sisters, remains one of the great underrated thrillers of the past 25 years, and one of the most overlooked queer romances. A noirish story of betrayal, lust and scheming, the sparks between Corky (Gina Gershon) and Violet (Jennifer Tilly) fly, creating one of the sexiest queer relationships to ever hit the big screen. It brings us massive pleasure to see the two pull off their mob-robbing scheme. It brings us more to see the two drive off into the sunset together.
How could we overlook Maureen & Joanne, icons of lesbian song-and-dance in Rent? True, the movie version of Rent may have fallen short of its potential. Also true: Maureen & Joanne have one very volatile relationship. Still, for anyone who has experienced the jerks of on-again-off-again romance, or especially worked through them to find a healthy long-term relationship, seeing the two end up together feels very satisfying. That they sing some great songs along the way helps too.
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Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
We fell in love with Benjamin, the queer Brit comedy, when we caught it at Frameline43 last year. It gets a full stateside release later this year, so keep it in mind. The movie concerns a neurotic filmmaker who falls hard for a French rock singer, and their rather awkward attempts at dating. Still, both characters are so dang likable we can’t help but root for them to end up together. As evidence look no further than a quiet scene of the two sharing a bath, which amounts to one of the sexiest scenes in film in a very, very long time.
Ok, so we can’t claim with certainty that the longtime romance of Chiron and Kevin, the two lifelong friends in Moonlight, actually culminates in a full-on coupling or marriage. Then again, Moonlight really isn’t about that. Rather, the film is about the undying bond between two men. Call it everlasting love…and that’s good enough for us.
The Hours doesn’t focus itself only on the relationship between longtime couple Clarissa & Sally, though their love, even when awkward, plays a pivotal role in a film all about characters struggling to find love and life in the face of death. Perhaps, for that reason, Clarissa ends up the healthiest of the movie’s three leads. That Oscar-winners Meryl Streep and Allison Janney bring a quirky charm to their love also helps, of course.
The romance between Freddie Mercury and boyfriend Jim Hutton as depicted in Bohemian Rhapsody certainly has its critics, both in terms of factual accuracy, and in terms of the way the film portrays affection between the two. Regardless, we get a certain warm & fuzzy satisfaction of seeing the to find love with one another, which helps soften the sting left by Mercury’s all-too-tragic end.
The beautiful gay love story of My Beautiful Launderette remains one of the best to come out of the 1990s indie filmmaking scene thanks in large part to the honest depiction of playful affection between the main characters, Omar and Johnny. As the film closes with the two splashing at one another across a washbasin, we can’t help but feel all’s right with the world.
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djbear
You miss several – I think of Call Me by Your Name in particular – particularly if you read the book. I know Brokeback Mountain did not last to the end but it meant so much to me as it was supposedly 1961 in western Us (actually filmed in Canada) and I had my firsy summer job in western Canada in 1960 and repeated it in 1961 and had a crush on one of my co-workers – the scenery and the awakening in that film just was amazing. My partner also saw it more than once before we got together 16 years ago.
toddlicious
Agreed.
dali
Did you read the title? This post is about adorable cinematic couples. Nothing to do with gay awekening films that you are suggesting. So yeah. Call Me by Your Name is not in the list, nor is Brokeback Mountain.
Jerry
We need more white, gay, male, couples in media/movies.
Jon in Canada
No, what’s needed is rich non-white/non-cis producers and/or rich folk (of which there are many) to step up and produce films that reflect their lives and experiences as well. If white cis producers made films about non-white or non-cis stories there’d be screams and cancel culture howls of indignation and you know it. So enough with the white guilt whine and manufactured self-flagellation, time for others to step up to tell their stories as well.
Kangol2
Any reason there was no mention Noah and Wade from 2008’s Noah’s Arc: Jumping the Broom, which featured one of the first Black gay weddings in US cinema? It was a good movie too!
hotdogla
Freddy and Jim, so good.
Bubbleandsqueal
MBL was made in 1985, so it was a real trailblazer.