How queer movies are going beyond the lesbian-gay binary and mainstream themes to explore layered narratives

In the last couple of years, LGBTQIA+ films have taken a leap from focusing on the heartbreaks of gay men and lesbian women — primarily white protagonists — to narratives of transgender persons, the perils of masculinity, and what queerness looks like outside of the Global North. The first two major international film festivals of this year, Berlinale and Sundance, premiered a spate of films with transgender protagonists and actors. Transgender filmmakers and actors are leaning into the much-debated question of authenticity in queer cinema, advocating for lived realities. Although still largely an exception, queer people of colour are gaining recognition at international film festivals and awards. Exploring the struggles of a Chinese American immigrant in accepting the sexuality of her lesbian daughter, Everything Everywhere All at Once bagged seven Oscars this year. LGBTQIA+ stories are also transcending drama and occupying genres like noir thriller and science fiction. Queer filmmakers are no longer hesitant to project LGBTQIA+ people as complex, and sometimes problematic, individuals. In the Oscar-nominated Tár, Cate Blanchett captivatingly portrays a lesbian maestro with conservative views and a lecherous eye. Sex among queer characters is no longer an event or turning point in the narrative.

Deep in the woods, eight-year-old Coco is swimming in a lake with her great-aunt Lourdes. As they wash, Lourdes instructs Coco to scrub herself thoroughly. “A girl’s penis must be sparkling clean,” she declares. It is an affirming moment for Coco, who is otherwise assumed to be a boy by her family and addressed in confusing ways. Now she finds an unlikely ally in her great-aunt, a gentle (probably queer) beekeeper.

Spanish filmmaker Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren’s empathetic debut feature film  20,000 Species of Bees, which premiered at the recently-concluded Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale) 2023, is the latest in a growing canon of queer cinema that explores the complexities of gender identity.

In the last couple of years, LGBTQIA+ films have taken a leap from focusing on the heartbreaks of gay men and lesbian women — primarily white protagonists — to narratives of transgender persons, the perils of masculinity, and what queerness looks like outside of the Global North. The first two major international film festivals of this year, Berlinale and Sundance, premiered a spate of films —  20,000 Species…,  Kokomo City,  Mutt,  Bis ans Ende der Nacht, and  Orlando, My Political Biography — with transgender protagonists and actors.

Both  20,000 Species, which portrays a trans child in the Basque Country, and  Mutt, a chronicle of a day in the life of a young trans man, inspect the dissonance between self-identity and society’s gaze. While  Mutt is somewhat didactic and can be a beginner’s guide to understanding the blurry contours of the gender binary, the film platforms the oft-neglected voice of a trans man (played by Lío Mehiel, a trans actor and filmmaker).

Transgender filmmakers and actors are leaning into the much-debated question of authenticity in queer cinema, advocating for lived realities. Films such as D. Smith’s  Kokomo City, Vuk Lungulov-Klotz’s  Mutt, and Paul B. Preciado’s  Orlando, My Political Biography have trans filmmakers at the helm, paving the way for accurate representation and self-reflection.

Preciado’s biographical feature is envisioned as a letter to Virginia Woolf, who published  Orlando: A Biography in 1928, in which a poet transitions from man to woman and lives for centuries. The filmmaker confides in Woolf that the world is slowly transforming away from the gender binary, much like in her novel nearly a century earlier.

In  Kokomo City — a portrait of four black transgender sex workers in America — Smith negotiates the power dynamics between the audience and the protagonists by defying the traditional (often voyeuristic) documentary format and absolving its subjects of the conventional narrative of victimhood. The comfort level brought in by the presence of a trans filmmaker is palpable, as the protagonists mince no words in recounting their experiences with their male clients.