The 18 best queer coming-of-age movies
Before watching the wonderfully raunchy new comedy Bottoms, check out these terrific films with LGBTQ+ themes, characters, storylines, or moments
Film Features Queer
Graphic: The A.V. Club
Bottoms, a raunchy, bloody comedy from director Emma Seligman (Shiva Baby), is kicking and punching its way into theaters on August 25. The film stars Rachel Sennott (Bodies, Bodies, Bodies) and Ayo Edebiri (The Bear) as two teenage “ugly, untalented gays” who end up starting a fight club at their school in order to, in the film’s excellent parlance, “get some cooch.” It’s horny. It’s fruity. It’s hormonal. It’s so very high school.
And—unlike its protagonists—it’s not alone. There are plenty of terrific LGBTQ+ high school and coming-of-age films available to stream or watch in theaters. So before taking a friend or future lover to the multiplex this weekend to check out Bottoms, take a look at our list of other very angsty, very queer, and very good coming-of-age films—listed in alphabetical order—to really get yourself in the mood.
28 Comments
I remember all the ads for But I’m a Cheerleader tried to make it look like a goofy misunderstanding comedy where everyone falsely thinks she’s gay. Then people watched the movie and the first thing you see is images of bouncing boobs going through her head while she’s kissing someone.
Lol, yea that thew me! I know ‘stunning and brave’ is a cliche now, but I really did think that of this movie back when it came out.
Handsome Devil is nothing like Heartstopper, the two queer people are centred as friends until a massive betrayal.And Love Simon is awful, it’s a shitty movie with a shitty message – who in their right mind would disown, shame and deride a friend that came to them and said “I’m being blackmailed by this person who is threatening to out me”?The message in that movie is vile.
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My Own Private Idaho deserves a spot on this list, I found it very transformative in the 90s.
This writer isn’t aware of any films that came out before 1995.
this might be the worst list ive ever seen
Don’t worry, a worse one will be posted tomorrow.
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The half of it is a fantastic movie.
Leah Lewis was so charming and real in The Half of It & a very different performance from the feisty George on Nancy Drew
If you want more Haley Graham find Rookie Blue out there where shes in a Cop Procedural Along with Gregory Smith from Everwood.
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But I’m a Cheerleader was so far ahead of its time that I think we still haven’t caught up to it
Holy shit the recency bias is staggering. Where on earth is Edge of Seventeen?!
Edge of Seventeen may or may not have been the best movie, but it was the most accurate. And it didn’t sugarcoat how young gay men often treated their best female friend (who was secretly in love with him) like garbage.
Was Edge of 17 really a queer coming of age movie? It’s been a while since I’ve seen but I don’t remember that
You might not be thinking of the right movie, then.
Oh you’re right, I was thinking of the one with Hailee Steinfeld. I was thinking there must’ve been some subtext that went right over my head! Thanks!
I always feel like I’m going to have my membership to the queer community revoked when I say this but Call Me By Your Name is not good? I hated the book and the movie. Book Elio is insufferable and pretentious. He’s rich, pretty, good at everything (plays like 4 instruments and speaks 6 languages fluently) spends a summer pining for the guy he gets to hook up with anyway. There’s no conflict? Of course they’re going to not end up together. He’s 17 and Oliver is 24 and lives in another country.They’re both fully bisexual and not gay, something the film sort of glosses over. Both of them have sexual relationships with and end up married to women not because they’re forced into the closet or particularly tortured about their identities or feel like they can’t be open about them. Bi-erasure in a queer romance is an odd look.Timmy is playing a 17 year old but looks 12 and Armie Hammer rightly gives all of us the ick. His character is supposed to be 24 but he was like 38 at the time and looks like a 45 year old sunburned cannibal? The age gap in the book is pretty iffy already but the film casting made it even worse.And the ending…That wasn’t even Sufjan Steven’s best song. People act like no one has ever cried over a breakup while a sad song plays in a movie before. Michael Stuhlbarg was great, though.
It’s a fair assessment and you’re 100% right about bi-erasure; I really enjoyed the movie but I wouldn’t say it’s one of my favourites. Michael Stuhlbarg is beyond fantastic in it though, I think maybe his role alone elevates the film.God’s Own Country that released around the same time was the far superior movie and story, in my opinion.The list is very…safe? Certainly it feels like perhaps Google was used rather than an actual knowledge of queer cinema.
“Red White and Royal Blue” is boring, with bad acting.
I see the absence of Edge of Seventeen has been covered. I’d like to throw Maurice in there as well.
Easy A is so antisex that it really is a terrible movie. For something with iconography of embracing a scarlet letter and being a slut it sure ends with “and you are all wrong for judging me because I didn’t actually sleep with those people” with the strong implications of they would be right to judge her if she did.
Yea, Stick It doesn’t work. That was definitely a reach. I like the movie, but something it did that kind of annoyed me, was show that these gymnasts are still boy crazy bimbos, if all that pesky ‘hard work’ didn’t get in their way. It would go on to inspire a whole tv series about just that called Make It or Break It.
Does Saved! count? I liked Saved! https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0332375/
The movies that I thought were most glaringly lacking are _D.E.B.S._ (both short (2003) and feature-length (2004) versions) and _The Incredibly True Adventures of Two Girls in Love_ (1995).
Since Edge of Seventeen has been covered, I’d like to add Beautiful Thing from 1996. The Brits do this so much better.