LGBTQ+ Movies that Don't Blow

Nic and Jules are in a long term, committed, loving but by no means perfect same-sex relationship. Nic, a physician, needs to wield what she believes is control, whereas Jules, under that control, is less self-assured. During their relationship, Jules has floundered in her "nine to five" life, sometimes trying to start a business - always unsuccessfully - or being the stay-at-home mom. She is currently trying to start a landscape design business. They have two teen-aged children, Joni (conceived by Nic) and Laser (by Jules). Although not exact replicas, each offspring does more closely resemble his/her biological mother in temperament. Joni and Laser are also half-siblings, having the same unknown sperm donor father. Shortly after Joni's eighteenth birthday and shortly before she plans to leave the house and head off to college, Laser, only fifteen and underage to do so, pleads with her to try and contact their sperm donor father. Somewhat reluctantly, she does. He is late thirty-something Paul, a co-op farmer and restaurateur. Despite his seemingly successful businesses, Paul has always shirked responsibility, most specifically in his personal life. After Joni and Laser meet with Paul, Nic and Jules learn what their children have done and, although they don't want Paul infiltrating their lives, want to meet him - especially as Joni and Laser seem to want to maintain some sort of relationship with him. As Paul's relationship with the entire family grows (which includes his hiring Jules to design and construct his backyard), they have an effect on what he wants in life. In turn, he affects their family dynamic as well as each person's relationships outside of it.

Life really sucks for a group of gay and lesbian teenagers living in Los Angeles. Their parents kicked them out, they're broke and bored, their lovers cheat on them, they're harassed by gay-bashers. If things are going to be this way, maybe suicide isn't a bad idea; at least not in the mind of Andy, our major protagonist, who gives the film its title by describing himself as "totally fucked up."

When Miss Stevens chaperones three of her students - Billy, Margot and Sam - on a weekend trip to a drama competition, she discovers that coming of age stories aren't just for teenagers. Exploring the fine line between being a grown up and being a kid, MISS STEVENS looks at the moment you realize maybe you're the responsible adult in the room, and what comes after you find out you're not who you thought you'd be.

Meeting your girlfriend's family for the first time can be tough. Planning to propose at her family's annual Christmas dinner - until you realize that they don't even know she's gay - is even harder. When the mentally challenged Abby (Kristen Stewart) learns that Harper (Mackenzie Davis) has kept their relationship a secret from her family, she begins to question the girlfriend she thought she knew.

A chance meeting brings a nearly perfect couple together in L.A., except that he's gay and she's not. Compounding this is that he suffers OCD. As he house sits and she struggles to be accepted as an actress, their otherwise rightness is obvious, but friends - especially those in the gay community - believe in clear lines of sexuality being drawn.

Pennsylvania, 1993. After getting caught with another girl, teenager Cameron Post is sent to a conversion therapy center run by the strict Dr. Lydia Marsh and her brother, Reverend Rick, whose treatment consists in repenting for feeling "same sex attraction." Cameron befriends fellow sinners Jane and Adam, thus creating a new family to deal with the surrounding intolerance.

Sasha and Paige's co-dependent friendship is tested as Paige gets serious with a guy for the first time.

About a recent college grad who returns home while she tries to figure out what to do with her life.

Funny and provocative, Boy Meets Girl vividly captures the giddy excitement, sexual heat, and inherent heartache of "non-traditional" love in a small town. Ricky (Michelle Hendley) is a 21-year-old trans girl living in Kentucky. Her only real friend, straight-laced Robby, has been her trusty, totally platonic, confidant for over 15 years. Her day job slinging lattes is merely a stepping-stone toward her goal of being a famous New York designer. She's confident, cool, and completely ready for something new - and then her world is transformed when an enchanting debutante saunters into her life. Triggering fresh feelings and experiences, this unlikely connection conjures up intense questions about identity while uncovering ghosts from Ricky's past. Indie-film veteran Eric Schaeffer (My Life's in Turnaround, If Lucy Fell) builds a compelling, compassionate world that focuses on the emotions and messy challenges of complex people navigating complicated relationships. Schaeffer creates a thoroughly authentic small-town atmosphere, capturing the cozy and claustrophobic ambiance of a place where everyone knows your name - and your sexual partners.

Mary is a senior at American Eagle Christian High School in suburban Baltimore. She considers herself born again; her rebirth was at age three. Her best friends are two classmates that comprise the Christian Jewels band with her. Hilary Faye is the alpha Christian who outwardly is perfect, especially in her connection to God Veronica is ethnic Vietnamese who was adopted and thus saved by a black Christian couple. A third is Tia, who is generally an outsider in her geek status but who aspires to be in this Christian clique. Also within their social circle--solely from necessity--is Hilary Faye's older brother Roland, who has been in a wheelchair since age nine after falling out of a tree; out of family obligation Hilary Faye transports him to and from school and everywhere else, but the rest of the time the siblings scorn each other. One of Hilary Faye's God-driven missions for the year is to save new student Cassandra, a Jewish girl who was expelled from her last school and only attends this faith-based school as a marginally-better option than the alternative. Mary's world starts to fall apart just before the start of the school year when her boyfriend Dean tells her he thinks he's gay. Mary receives what she believes are messages from God, including one indirectly through Hilary Faye, that make her believe she can save Dean by having sex with him and if this does save Dean, God will restore her spiritual virginity. The outcome? Dean is outed anyway and sent away for conversion therapy; and Mary becomes pregnant, something she doesn't tell Dean or Lillian, her mother. Her pregnancy affects how she treats another new student, Patrick, the son of the school's principal, Pastor Skip. As Mary tries to figure out what to do, her Christian faith is tested by many other Christians justifying what may be considered sins in having a higher Godly purpose, which she is unaware includes a relationship between her mother and married Pastor Skip.

In 1973, 18-year-old Beth Bledsoe moves from her home in Creekville, South Carolina, to attend college in New York City. Her uncle Frank Bledsoe is a college professor there, and is the relative she feels closest to as he is more refined and thoughtful than the rest of the family.

Max is a trendy, pretty, young lesbian, who is having trouble finding love. A friend sets her up with Ely, whom Max likes, but Ely is frumpy, homely, and older. Nor do they have much in common. Can Max learn to look past the packaging?

A 16 year old Louisiana girl moves in with her homosexual half-brother and immediately starts coming on to his sexual partner, finally forcing him into an affair in which she becomes pregnant. The whole affair blows into a scandal exposing her school teacher brother and the true parent of the child is called into question as it is revealed that there have been a series of lovers.

Cheryl is young, Black, and lesbian, working in Philadelphia with her best friend Tamara and consumed by a film project: to make a video about her search for a Black actress from Philly who appeared in films in the 30s and was known as the Watermelon Woman. Following various leads, Cheryl discovers the Watermelon Woman's stage name and real name and surmises that the actress had a long affair with Martha Page, a White woman and one of Hollywood's few female directors. As she's discovering these things, Cheryl becomes involved with Diana, who's also White. The affair strains Cheryl's friendship with Tamara. More discoveries bring Cheryl (and us, her audience) to new realizations.

Awkward teen Adam spends his last high school summer with his big sister, who throws herself into NYC's lesbian and trans activist scene. In this coming-of-age comedy, Adam and those around him encounter love, friendship and hard truths.

Anna is a young lesbian high school graduate who still lives with her parents, and works as a receptionist in a plastic surgeon's office. She embarks on a wild ride when she hooks up with a cadre of ultra-radical feminist lesbians hell-bent on raising hell. But things get even more complicated when Anna falls in love with Sadie, the radical group's leader who's already involved with an older woman named Courtney.

Jessica Stein is a single, straight, successful, journalist, part of a bonded Jewish family living in New York City, who finds herself not as straight as she thought when Jessica meets and begins an intense friendship with career woman Helen Cooper which ultimately leads to romance.

Lucy and Jane have been best friends their entire lives. Only when Lucy embarks on a personal journey, will she face a test of her friendship, and her sense of self, on a path she may not be entirely ready to take.