★★★☆☆
Loosely based on the gentle, charming Italian 2008 film Mid-August Lunch, a national holiday when cities are deserted, Four Mothers, directed by Darren Thornton, opens out into a broader Irish take on getting old and being gay.
★★★★☆
A young writer dives into the world of sex work for content for his debut novel: soon the lines between research and reality become blurred in writer-director Mikko Mäkelä’s Sebastian.
★★★☆☆
Young bisexual Antonio drifts through life lying, stealing, and using people while feeling incapable of love in writer-director Sacha Amaral’s Buenos Aires-set character study The Pleasure Is Mine.
★★★★☆
The affair between a young actor and a politician comes under increasing threat as their public profiles grow and the stakes rise in erotic thriller Night Stage from writer/directors Filipe Matzembacher and Marcio Reolon.
★★★★☆
Near the Pakistan border, in Kashmir a young security guard from Kerala forms a meaningful bond with a local man amidst political unrest in the groundbreaking drama We Are Faheem & Karun.
★★★★☆
Two men, each having a tough time, meet during one London evening and spend the night talking and learning about themselves in director Liam Calvert’s A Night Like This.
★★★☆☆
Benji is left broken after the end of his relationship with Jake. In flashback we’re taken through Benji’s difficult journey with Jake in the painful and funny Departures.
★★★★☆
Lonely scientist Harvey lives a solitary life but discovering Cherub, a magazine for larger men and their admirers, leads to unexpected confidence and joy in writer-director Devin Shears’ Cherub.
★★★☆☆
Misericordia by Alain Guiraudie is an entertaining and disturbing mixture of sex and death.
★☆☆☆☆
Sofia and Rose have relocated to Spain to try and cure Rose’s mysterious health condition. While supporting her mother, Sofia falls for the enigmatic Ingrid in Rebecca Lenkiewicz’s directorial debut Hot Milk.
★★★☆☆
April is Autism Acceptance Month and Peckhamplex has a special screening of The Stimming Pool, made by The Neurocultures Collective.
★★★★☆
A year after losing her father, teenager Summer falls for a football star, coming to learn about both herself and her late father in the process, in writer/director Divine Sung’s sensitive coming-of -age drama Summer’s Camera.
★★★★☆
When Autumn Falls by François Ozon is a beguiling mixture of genres, suspense, love and beauty.
★★★★☆
On Falling, a first feature directed by Laura Carreira, is a worthy addition to the Ken Loach trilogy on Sixteen Films: the lives of people struggling on low-wage or zero-hours contracts.