The 58 Best LGBTQ Movies Ever Made

Netflix

Fear Street is based on R.L. Stine’s book series of the same name. The film trilogy follows Kiana Madeira, a teenage girl who realizes her hometown is suffering the consequences of an ancient curse. When her girlfriend and friend group become the target of grizzly attacks, Kiana goes on a mission to rid them of the curse once and for all.

Hulu

The Miseducation of Cameron Post takes place in 1993, following the adventures of Cameron, a teenage girl sent to a “treatment” center after hooking up with her school’s prom queen. The team that runs the facility? They subject Cameron and the other residents to strange gay conversion therapies. But to their surprise, Cameron and the friends she makes during her stay are merely playing along until they can get released.

Hulu

Who says you can’t watch a Christmas movie in June? Happiest Season follows Abby, a young woman planning to propose to her girlfriend, Harper, during her family’s annual Christmas party. But her plans get complicated, when she learns Harper hasn’t come out to her narrow-minded parents.

Peacock Amazon

Booksmart follows two high school scholars on a mission. Before graduating, they want just one wild night out. For Molly, that means loosening up enough to have a little fun. Amy? Well, that means working up the nerve to approach her crush. Their wishes lead them to a series of graduation parties as they try to cram four years of recklessness into one unforgettable night.

Hulu Amazon

Ammonite is a romantic drama that stars the great Kate Winslet and the also-great Saoirse Ronan. The story follows Mary Anning (Winslet) a paleontologist who sells fossils to tourists to support her elderly mother. Her life changes when a visitor hires her to tend to his wife, whom she finds herself inexplicably drawn to.

Peacock

Knock at the Cabin follows two dads and their young daughter, who travel to a remote cabin for a family vacation. Their plans for a relaxing stay are upended when a group of armed strangers breaks in and forces them to make a life-altering decision. They can either choose a family member to sacrifice, or allow an apocalypse to take over the world. M. Night Shyamalan-esque antics ensue.

Amazon

Rent is a movie musical that is loosely based on the 1896 opera, La bohéme. The film follows a group of young artists who live in Manhattan’s East Village. While they struggle to make ends meet, their lives are further complicated by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Through all the ups and downs, they rely on each other as a chosen family to survive.

Amazon Apple

If it feels a bit like a CW version of an Afterschool Special, that’s no mistake: teen-tv super-producer Greg Berlanti makes his feature film directorial debut here. It’s as chaste a love story as you’re likely to see in the 21st century— the hunky gardener who makes the title teen question his sexuality is wearing a long-sleeved shirt, for God’s sake—but you know what? The queer kids of the future need their wholesome entertainment too.

Amazon Hulu

A gay fantasia on Elton themes. An Elton John biopic was never going to be understated, but this glittering jukebox musical goes way over the top and then keeps going. It might be an overcorrection from the straight-washing of the previous year’s Bohemian Rhapsody, but when it’s this much fun, it’s best not to overthink it.

Netflix Amazon

Charming Irish movie that answers the question: “What if John Hughes were Irish and gay?” Misfit Ned struggles at a rugby-obsessed boarding school until a mysterious new kid moves in and an unlikely friendship changes them both. Along the way, a rousing performance from Andrew Scott as an inspiring teacher with a secret of his own, and a rugby game set to a Rufus Wainwright song. Just the thing to lift your spirits.

Amazon The Roku Channel

The life of Cuba’s “transformistas” is captured beautifully in this father-son story about a boy who wants to perform drag and his father, newly released from prison and unable to accept who his son is. Shot beautifully, with great music and a close look at Havana in all its run-down and colorful glory.

Amazon Apple TV Filmstruck

The quintessential ’80s lesbian romantic drama, Desert Hearts follows an English professor and a young sculptor as they fall in love at a Nevada ranch in the 1950s. Unique for its time, it sets its romance in a warm, affirming environment and lets its leads enjoy their relationship without angst or fear of death.

Amazon Apple TV

Ira Sachs’s autobiographical drama packs a hard punch as it follows a filmmaker, Erick, throughout his relationship with a young lawyer, Paul, which begins as a random sexual encounter and implodes following Paul’s drug and sex addiction.

Max

Wong Kar-wai won Best Director at the 1997 Cannes Film Festival for this film about two Hong Kong men who emigrate to Buenos Aires, after the handover of Hong Kong to China put LGBT lives in jeopardy.

Netflix

Former SNL head-writer and The Other Two co-creator Chris Kelly makes his directorial debut in a semi-autobiographical account of his mother’s death from cancer. Molly Shannon gives a devastating performance, the tragic qualities of the Sacramento gay bar are hilariously explored, and the viewer is forced to re-evaluate Train’s “Drops of Jupiter.” Given how much you will cry, this is perhaps a risky watch in a time when tissue paper is scarce. We say pull a full-size bath towel out of the cabinet and dive in.

Paramount+ Showtime

Cheryl Dunye directs and stars in this microbudget indie about an African-American lesbian searching for an uncredited black actress from a 1930s film. Along the way, she falls in and out of love, and meets the real Camille Paglia.

Amazon Apple TV

Julianne Moore and Annette Bening play lesbian mothers to two teenagers whose blissful modern family is rocked when their kids seek out their sperm-doner father played by Mark Ruffalo. The family unit falls into crisis when his sudden appearance into their lives causes a rift between the two women as well as their kids

Amazon Apple TV

Starring Mariel Hemingway and a raft of real-life track and field stars, Personal Best follows a young bisexual pentathlete vying for a spot on the U.S. Olympic Team and exploring a relationship with her lesbian coach—played by Olympic hurdler Patrice Donnelly.

Amazon Apple TV

Eliza Hittman’s dark and moody film plays out a bit like a thriller, one in which a Brooklyn teenager named Frankie (a superb Harris Dickinson, in a nearly wordless performance), who spends his idle hours hanging with his delinquent friends, fooling around with his girlfriend, or hooking up with men he meets online. Beach Rats is a provocative look at the personal and secret urges we often fear will come out into the light.