Here are two films that could easily be referenced as gay films, but while the main protagonists are gay, the movies are more than about that world and are worth exploring. 

Passages (Amazon Prime on Demand) - Tomas (Frank Rogowski) and Martin (Ben Whishaw) are in what seems to be a stable, secure gay marriage. Tomas is a German film Director, while Martin is a British Graphic artist. When Martin refuses to dance with Tomas at a wrap party, Tomas randomly finds himself dancing with Agathe (Adele Exarchopoulos). Strangely, he finds he’s aroused, and when they head to the apartment of a familiar friend for the after-party, the two end up in a bedroom and make Love. Tomas is open about this the following day when he returns home to Martin. And yes, it doesn’t end there, so the relationship between Tomas and Martin is put into crisis mode. Directed by Ira Sachs, Passages is a cutting, honest, often funny look at fidelity, promiscuity, and modern love.

What’s revealing about the film’s attack is that it doesn’t take the easy route of one partner being promiscuous and just cheating around but dwells on the more complicated matter of how one partner suddenly finds heterosexual love attractive and seeks to be a biological father. There’s also Martin embarking on his new relationship with the writer Ahmad (Erwan Falé); but obviously, that pales in the narrative when compared with the Tomas-Agathe side of the equation. This is a very grown-up film, with a straightforward depiction of lovemaking between two men or a man and woman. And it does highlight how, when words fail, the movement between naked bodies, touch and feel, say so much more than words can. It’s mature and forthright, and we can’t ask for more.

All of Us Strangers (Amazon Prime on Demand) - When we first meet Adam (Andrew Scott), we see him in his apartment and ​immediately sense that he’s a shy, introspective loner living in London ​alone. A neighbor in the same apartment block, Harry (Paul Mescal)​, flirts with him, but Adam is initially reluctant to engage with the seemingly drunk neighbor. In what must pass as a scene of sensitive magical realism, Adam visits his childhood home and inexplicably sees his mother (Claire Foy) and his Dad (Jamie Bell), and they interact with the grown-up Adam. It would seem that the parents passed away in a motor accident when Adam was just a young boy. So this is wish fulfillment of some kind, this carrying on with the parents you lost at a tender age.

So yes, at one level, one can be nearsighted and point to the gay characters of Adam and Harry and decide that’s all there is to this film. But while the main characters may be gay, the film tackles grief and the coping mechanisms we come up with to help us get on with Life. It’s​important to note that Adam has mental health issues and that while seeming to function as a regular person, there are deep underlying issues that he can’t seem to process. Directed by Andrew Haigh, the character of Harry and his function is a great reveal in the storytelling that this film is all about. Based on a 1987 Taichi Yamada novel, Strangers​, the film is ​carried mainly on the shoulders of Andrew Scott - he is the saddest smile you’ll see onscreen today, and it speaks volumes of what lies underneath.