Celebrating Pride Month With a Shudder’s LGBTQ+ Collection

To celebrate Pride Month, we curated a collection of great films that have queer themes and characters, as well as some LGBTQ+ writers, directors, and producers. Two that standout are the Shudder premieres of Knife+Heart (2018) and The Wild Boys (2017). 

From writer/director Yann Gonzalez and writer Cristiano Mangione, Knife+Heart is an stylish, blood-soaked ode to ’70s-era De Palma, Argento, and Friedkin, shot on 35mm with a killer retro score from M83. Set in Paris during the summer of 1979, the film follows Anne (French pop star Vanessa Paradis), who produces third-rate gay porn. After her editor and lover Lois leaves her, she tries to win her back by shooting her most ambitious film yet with her trusted, flaming sidekick Archibald. But one of her actors is brutally murdered and Anne gets caught up in a strange investigation that turns her life upside-down.

The Wild Boys comes from writer/director Bertrand Mandico. The film focuses on five adolescent boys (all played by actresses) enamored by the arts but drawn to crime and transgression. As punishment for a brutal crime, they’re forced to board a boat whose captain is hell-bent on taming their ferocious appetites. After arriving on a lush island where dangers and pleasures abound, the boys start to transform in both mind and body. 

Other films in the collection include The Old Dark House (1932), Vampyros Lesbos (1971), Hellraiser (1987), Nightbreed (1990), Let the Right One In (2008), Predestination (2014), Alena (2015), Sweet Sweet Lonely Girl (2016), Rift (2017), and Lizzie (2018).