The queer film you should watch before pride month ends based on your Lancs Uni degree

Now that Sugar’s pride nights have been and gone, you might be wondering how else you can celebrate in little old Lancaster’s last pride month week, especially if most of your mates have gone home already.

While we all love the parades and the nights out, Pride has never just been about partying; as well as being a bunch of fun, it’s a protest, it’s representation, it’s community, and it’s a celebration of all the wonderful art and achievements attributed to LGBTQ+ people.

So, how better to appreciate pride in all its fab fullness than with a movie night?

Without further ado, here’s the queer film you need to watch before the end of June based on your Lancaster Uni degree.

[And if your course isn’t on here, just watch them all. Problem solved.]

Sports and exercise science – But I’m A Cheerleader

Bit on the nose? Maybe. But this groundbreaking, colour-popping, satirical 1999 film will definitely be a hit with anyone who has a penchant for ironic humour and can usually be found somewhere around Lancaster Sport.

But I’m A Cheerleader follows Megan, the “ideal” daughter and student from a cushy American neighbourhood, when she is sent by her parents to a conversion camp called “True Directions.”

The film takes this undeniably serious premise and intentionally makes a complete mockery of conversion therapy and homophobia in 1990s America.

It’s the perfect watch for an athlete since it’s got all the qualities of basically any Roses event: the intensity of disappointment and fear of failure, like a whole crowd is scrutinising you from the stands; the euphoria of the win and the gaggling group hug at the end of the match, the kiss at the end of the film; the joy, fun, banter and community found when you’re part of a team.

Plus, in the end, it’s actually Megan’s love for cheer that helps her confess her love for Graham. If you’ve got a passion for your sport and a craving for cringe 90s love confessions, you’ll adore this classic watch.

English literature – Portrait of a Lady on Fire

Yet another sapphic cult classic. However, this one’s much more likely to make you cry… And when we say cry, we mean bawl your eyes out.

Portrait of a Lady on Fire is an undeniably beautiful film following the doomed love story between the high-status, highly stubborn Héloïse and her portrait-painter Marianne. Much of the film’s plot, style and cinematography is inspired by the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice.

So even though Lancaster’s School of Arts has no classics department, this film absolutely must be watched, analysed and adored by Lancaster’s English literature students, who can spot a motif from a mile away.

It’s one of those stories where nothing happens and everything happens; there can be so little plot yet so much emotion evoked in a single scene, and your eyes will be glued to every expression, every colour, every movement of the camera.

So, English lit patrons, do what you do best: Overanalyse this masterpiece to the bone. You won’t regret it.

Although, your housemates might when they get sick of the sound of your night-long, “page-28”-induced sobbing.

Accounting and finance – Brokeback Mountain

We know what you’re thinking [probably something along the lines of “… What?!”] but stick with us here.

Frankly, if you’ve picked accounting and finance, good for you, you’re probably a maths whizz and a super speedy problem solver.

However, you’re also studying our worst-nightmare-subject, and the only explanation is that you have some deep-rooted, unresolved trauma that you choose to work through by showing your working out.

It’s highly unlikely that Brokeback Mountain has ever left anyone dry-eyed. Its gritty protagonist cowboys, Jack and Ennis, have a beautiful connection and a tragic love story, rife with themes of masculinity, desire and homophobia, societal and internalised alike.

If you’re seeking a light-hearted watch, you might want to look elsewhere. But if you’re an accounting and finance student, we have a feeling you might need a good cry. So, stick on this film and make sure that multi pack of tissues is ready to go.

Theatre and Creative Writing – The Rocky Horror Picture Show

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We’d actually be pretty shocked if any theatre and creative writing student hadn’t already seen Rocky Horror. But if it’s somehow evaded your watchlist thus far, you should certainly shiver with antici… pation of seeing this gender-bending, weird and wonderful movie musical.

The costume design, the soundtrack, the characterisation, the daring, the dancing, the writing… There are truly endless sources of inspo you can get from this film. Even just from Dr Frank-N-Furter’s iconic elevator entrance, “you’re into a time slip… and nothing can ever be the same…”

Plus, next time The Time Warp inevitably starts playing after The Macarena or Come On, Eileen, you’ll be able to pull out all the stops in the dance department.

Philosophy – All Of Us Strangers

Sorry in advance, but it’s time to get the tissues out again.

All Of Us Strangers follows closed-off, cooped-up Adam, a screenwriter living in London who meets Harry, another man living in his building. As their relationship grows, Adam begins writing and decides to visit his childhood family home. But when he gets there, he encounters his parents – that is, the parents who died in a car crash decades earlier.

Highly conceptual and beautifully introspective, this film could appeal to anyone intrigued by the intricacies of the imagination and the messy crossovers between family and society, between truth and time.

With all its gasp-inducing plot twists, gorgeous cinematography, stellar characterisation, and heart-wrenching romance, this film is bound to capture the heart of an existentialist Lancastrian.

(… And then replace all the time they should be using to study Nietzsche with movie marathons of every piece of media Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal have ever been in.)

International business management – Bottoms

We all know it: Management School is Lancaster Uni’s favourite child.

And what else could we give the favourite child than the favourite film of probably most of the LGBTQ+ community worldwide?

Bottoms is satire done right… and messy, charming, hilarious queer women doing wrong. The film centres Josie and PJ, who form a girls’ “fight club” at school in order to win over their cheerleading crushes.

Yes, it champions sapphic love and women in community, but it’s also wheeze-inducingly funny and utterly insane, with iconic scenes and iconic songs alike.

IBM students, you may be the favourite children of Lancaster Uni, but here at The Lancaster Tab, we think you probably need a decent bit of entertainment at the end of a long, hard, [boring…], strategy-discussing, circle-back-promising day, and Bottoms is the perfect cure.

Psychology – Moonlight

Now, don’t lie psych students, we all know you’re secretly just in it to psychoanalyse everyone you know [and every random person you pass on the Spine, too].

If you want something you can really sink your analytical teeth into, as well as a film that’s stunning at every shot, Moonlight is the one for you this June.

The plot follows its protagonist Chiron through three stages of his life as he struggles with his childhood traumas of abuse in Miami, as well as how his identity as a black gay man impacts his life and love.

As well as – and perhaps even more than – dealing with the external social issues prevalent in film, Moonlight focuses on the internal, the emotional, the thoughts and feelings Chiron expresses, represses, fights to understand and deal with.

Chiron attempts to understand his own mind and self throughout this highly acclaimed piece of art. Does that not sound like a Lancs psychology student’s dream?

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Featured image via YouTube