Hot, Holy & Totally Unhinged: 2025’s Queer Film Forecast
From drag zombies to Kristen Stewart’s critically acclaimed directorial debut, Club Ciné previews the boldest LGBTQ+ films hitting screens in the second half of 2025
As Pride Month wraps, Club Ciné sets its sights on the queer film season ahead—and it’s anything but tame. Get ready for original tales of obsession, faith, desire, and yes, a little BDSM. We’re talking drag zombies, fever-dream musicals, and biopics with bite. From the defiant to the dazzling, hilarious to the unhinged, brace yourselves a humdinger second half of the year.
Lurker
Dir. Alex Russell
Cast: Théodore Pellerin, Archie Madekwe, Sunny Suljic
When a friendly hook-up enters the inner circle of a pop star, the line between desire and obsession becomes blurred and the relationship gets... complicated, in the debut feature from an Emmy award-winning writer and producer of Beef and The Bear.
The Little Sister
Dir. Hafsia Herzi
Cast: Nadia Melliti
Newcomer Nadia Melliti won Best Actress at Cannes – where this film also won the 2025 Queer Palm – playing Fatima, a queer Franco‑Algerian teen navigating faith, identity, and first love in suburban Paris.
Pillion
Dir. Harry Lighton
Cast: Alexander Skarsgård, Harry Melling, Lesley Sharp, Jake Shears
Bikers, BDSM and Alexander Skarsgård. We’re sold.
Peter Hujar’s Day
Dir. Ira Sachs
Cast: Ben Whishaw, Rebecca Hall
The queer indie auteur behind Love Is Strange (2014) and Passages (2023) has crafted an intimate, 75‑minute two-hander, with Whishaw as photographer Hujar and Hall the writer who helped chronicle a day in his life in downtown NYC in December 1974.
Sauna
Dir. Matthias Broe
Cast: Magnus Juhl Andersen, Nina Rask
Warmly received at Sundance earlier in the year, this very modern Danish love story between a gay man and trans man is set against the horny backdrop of a gay bathhouse. Featuring: drugs, strap-ons and, yes, douching.
Twinless
Dir. James Sweeney
Cast: Dylan O’Brien, James Sweeney, Lauren Graham
At a support group for twinless twins, two queer men forge a sexually charged friendship. Definitely one for those who take their comedy black.
Kiss of the Spider Woman
Dir. Bill Condon
Cast: Diego Luna, Jennifer Lopez, Tonatiuh
Forty years after William Hurt became the first actor to win an Oscar playing a gay role in the first movie of Manuel Puig’s iconic queer novel, set in an Argentine prison, comes the second. This time, it's musical.
Blue Moon
Dir. Richard Linklater
Cast: Ethan Hawke, Margaret Qualley, Andrew Scott
Musical biopic about American lyricist Lorenz Hart (Hawke), famous for songs Blue Moon and The Lady is a Tramp, who struggled throughout his life with shame over his queer identity.
Cactus Pears
Dir. Rohan Parashuram
Cast: Bhushaan Manoj, Suraaj Suman, Jayshri Jagtap
This Sundance‑winning debut is a tender love story that blooms between childhood friends, in the face of societal pressure, in rural India. With this, A Nice Indian Boy (dir. Roshan Sethi, 2024) and Oneness (dir. Priyakanta Laishram, 2024) queer Indian stories are having a cinematic moment.
Jimpa
Dir. Sophie Hyde
Cast: Olivia Colman, John Lithgow, Audrey-Mason Hyde
When a nonbinary teen tells her mother they want to go live with their gay grandfather in Amsterdam, an intergenerational reckoning ensues. A semi-autobiographical tale co-starring the trans nonbinary daughter of writer-director Hyde.
The Chronology of Water
Dir. Kristen Stewart
Cast: Imogen Poots, Thora Birch, Kim Gordon
Kristen Stewart won over the harshest of critics at Cannes this year with her daring directorial debut – a fragmented dive into queer author Lidia Yuknavitch’s brutal memoir, carried by a fearless star turn from Imogen Poots.
I Wish You All the Best
Dir. Tommy Dorfman
Cast: Corey Fogelmanis, Alexandra Daddario, Cole Sprouse
A favourite at SXSW this year, the directorial debut of the trans actor from Netflix's 13 Reasons Why concerns a nonbinary teen kicked out of home after coming out and then moves in with their estranged sister and her husband.
Mother Mary
Dir. David Lowry
Cast: Anne Hathaway, Michaela Coel, Hunter Schaffer
An epic music-industry-set melodrama from the writer-director of The Green Knight (2021), about a pop star (Hathaway) and her fashion-designer lover (Coel). With original songs by Charli XCX and Jack Antonoff, this looks unhinged and we’re excited.
Untitled Christy Martin biopic
Dir. David Michôd
Cast: Sydney Sweeney
The star of Immaculate (dir. Michael Mohan, 2024) muscled up to embody the champion boxer Christy “Coal Miner’s Daughter” Martin in a female‑Rocky story of identity, resilience, and survival that could propel her into the awards conversation.
The History of Sound
Dir. Oliver Hermanus
Cast: Paul Mescal, Josh O’Connor, Hadley Robinson
It's summer 1919, and Hollywood’s most desired leading men are in rural New Hampshire documenting folk songs – and falling for each other. Reviews from Cannes were mixed, with the undeniable talents of Mescal and O'Connor escaping the critics' ire.
Honey Don’t!
Dir. Ethan Coen
Cast: Margaret Qualley, Aubrey Plaza, Chris Evans
The second in Coen and co-writer and wife Trician Cooke's self-styled "lesbian B-movie trilogy", following Drive-Away Dolls (2024), sees Margaret Qualley resume her role as private eye Honey Donahue. This time she's investigating cults, corpses, and questionable Catholics.
Queens of the Dead
Dir. Tina Romero
Cast: Katy O’Brian, Margaret Cho, Cheyenne Jackson.
George A Romero did not only spawn the zombie movie genre, but also it's latest star filmmaker – daughter Tina, who takes her seat at the horror table with this queer, glam‑gore drag‑apocalypse in which drag queens and club kids battle zombies at a Brooklyn warehouse rave. A big gay zom‑com.
The Light Fantastic
Dir. Chris Cottam
Cast: Rupert Everett, Nathan Stewart‑Jarrett, Jeremy Irvine
A Blackpool-set rom-com about a gay firefighter with ballroom dancing dreams. Call your nan: this is giving multi-generational cult classic vibes.