Best gay horror films
Bruce LaBruce’s favourite gay horror films
Bruce LaBruce is a fan of skin. And it shows in his work. Raw, sweaty sensuality are consistent tropes in films of his: enjoy No Skin Off My Ass (1993) and the recent Gerontophilia(2013). The first of these films brought LaBruce fame as a queer director with nothing to hide: he starred, and had sex in it. The latter is a story about a childish man discovering he’s sexually attracted to old men. Despite the cross-generational sex scenes, the film was described by The Independent as a ‘toning down’ of the unsimulated sexual elements in his previous films.
And LaBruce – who has an upcoming retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art, NYC – depicts another of the prominent sensations we associate with skin: pain. In two of his other films, Otto (2008) and LA Zombie(2010), he looks at homosexuality at its most horrifyingly erotic, as zombies who wander the earth, eating (and doing) each other.
This fascination lends itself well to the fusion of the orgiastic depiction of homosexuality and horror in films. For more than half a century, filmmakers have been obsessed with both, sometimes even seeing them as natural bedfellows. In LaBr
19 Essential LGBTQ+ Horror Movies To Add To Your Halloween Watchlist
Master of horror Clive Barker's works own always been queer. From his initial Hellraiser, seeped in BDSM imagery, to the new Hulu remake, starring trans icon Jamie Clayton as queer diva Pinhead, his masterpiece about the pleasures of pain have changed how we think about horror.
His other works, including Nightbreed, about a group of monsters trying to escape humanity, have always focused on themes that have attracted queer people to horror, with alienation, otherness, and the grittiness of our world all being transformed into magnificently haunting works from Barker.
For those daring enough to dive into the pain of pleasure, check out any of these films for some truly standout queer horror.
The 2022 Hellraiser is available to stream on Hulu, with its original being ready on Amazon Prime, AMC+, Hoopla, and Shudder.
Nightbreed is obtainable to stream on Peacock, AMC+, and Shudder.
33 Essential LGBTQ+ Horror Movies
(Photo by © Altered Innocence / Courtesy: Everett Collection)
As elongated as there have been horror films, there include been queer horror films. Before homosexuality was formally legislated out of being in Hollywood by the Production Code — commonly referred to as the Hays Code, which established mandates for “moral standards” in motion pictures and banned depictions of “sexual perversity” — the legendary filmmaker James Whale was building the foundation for American genre cinema with films like Frankenstein, The Senior Dark House, and The Invisible Man. Here was Whale, a gay guy, building horror in his own image and having astounding box office success as some groups were lobbying Hollywood to censor queerness out of existence. Fortunately, they weren’t creative enough to drive the large bad Other away.
In the century since America became the world’s leader in horror film production, the genre became a bastion for the outsiders, the marginalized, the people made monsters by self-appointed adjudicators of sin, and who saw themselves in the supposed “villains” at the center of stories enjoy Dracula’s Daughter. On exceptional occasion, queer folk
50 LGBTQ+ HORROR FILMS FROM THE PAST 50 YEARS
It’s been 50 years since the historic Stonewall riots helped catalyse the lgbtq+ rights movement, and while we’ve still got a way to go, we’ve certainly come far. That became especially clear to me while catching up on some essential gay horror cinema over the course of Pride Month.
Horror has always had a nervous infatuation with Homosexual themes, and it’s straightforward to see why. Homosexual people are the “Other,” and anything that is Other poses a potential threat to the status quo. Sometimes that threat comes in the shape of a sexy woman-loving woman vampire, sure, but it’s a threat nonetheless that needs be safely neutralised before the credits roll.
At least, that’s how it used to play out.
Something interesting has started happening in recent years, though. Suddenly, the outsider has taken control of the lens, and rather than reaffirming the status quo, it seeks to scrutinize and challenge it. There’s still a distinct aura of discomfort and anxiety that hovers around many of these films, but it’s starting to dissipate. Soon, perhaps, the lgbtq+ horror film will be nothing to write place about, because it will be so commonplace that we’ll almost forget it
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