In an awards season largely devoid of LGBTQ content, one movie asserts itself as the exception by its very title.

Much-anticipated after its Venice Film Festival premiere, and buoyed by the buzz around star Daniel Craig’s performance and its well-publicized sex scenes, Luca Guadagnino’s “Queer” has begun rolling into theaters. Naturally, queer cinema buffs are eager to see a movie from the same filmmaker who delivered “Call Me By Your Name” and its leading man is arguably the sexiest of all the James Bonds – but if you’re expecting a feel-good story about LGBTQ Pride, this adaptation of a novella by famously countercultural “Beat era” writer William S. Burroughs is definitely not it. 

Its setting in 1950s Mexico City is enough to let you know that any queerness it presents for us is likely to be furtive, conducted in secrecy and shrouded in a sense of forbidden desire. Against this backdrop, brilliant-but-dissolute American William Lee (Craig) trolls the streets and clubs looking for sex, love, and connection among the other expatriates who gather nightly in the bars that cater to them. When a much-younger ex-Navy man named Eugene (Drew Starkey) catches his eye and seems responsive to his bold-but-clumsy flirtations, he becomes enamored – despite his own insecurities and his uncertainty over whether his new crush is even queer to begin with – and persists in his effort to get close to this much-younger fellow American.

There’s definitely a spark; the two move quickly from being mere drinking companions when an after-bar nightcap at his place turns into a naked overnight stay, and they become de facto lovers, though Eugene continues to maintain an emotional distance. Eventually, Lee proposes a trip together to find a rogue botanist (Leslie Manville) in South America and experiment with ayahuasca; the young man agrees, and the two set off to share an experience that may push the boundaries of their relationship – and their consciousness – further than either of them are prepared to go.

It’s not a particularly “story-oriented” film; the plot flows, almost like a stream of consciousness, through the repetitive patterns of daily existence, moving between concrete reality, jarring memory, and hallucinatory exaltation to approximate an inner narrative rather than propel an outer one. This reflects the similar fluctuation in Burroughs’s writing, but also takes the audience into the subjective experience of Lee – a fictionalized version of the author himself – and allows us to see the threads of consistent meaning that turn the hedonistic blur into a visceral reminder of the intensity with which life often takes place, especially when longing, desire, and loneliness are involved. Ultimately, the adaptation by screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes treats the material almost as a “meta-biopic” of Burroughs himself, a bittersweet and characteristically raw collection of impressionistic memories given narrative structure by the conceit of fiction.

In keeping with that choice, Craig delivers a masterful performance that succeeds in channeling the late author’s uniquely unfiltered personality while never feeling like an attempt at mimicry. The former 007 reminds us of the insightful talent that made him a star even before his run as the iconic super agent, discarding the familiar suave charisma for a nervous awkwardness that underscores Lee’s eternal sense of being an outsider, but conveying with equal clarity the euphoric heights and humiliating lows of his emotional and intellectual landscape. Already the winner of the National Board of Review’s Best Actor prize, it’s a star turn that anchors the film and helps it achieve the homage to Burroughs – an under appreciated pioneer and alternative icon for the queer community, though he reportedly once disowned what was then called the “Gay Rights Movement” by saying “I have never been gay a day in my life and I’m sure as hell not a part of any movement” – that it rightly intends to pay.

As the object of his affections, costar Starkey brings more than just his compelling yet somehow unconventional good looks to the mix. He makes Eugene at once an enigma and a familiar archetype of sensitive-yet-callow youth, a pleasure-seeker able to embrace and delight in the joys of the moment with full authenticity. He has a palpable chemistry with Craig, only enhanced by those much-touted sex scenes (which manage to leave little to the imagination without showing anything explicit), and makes us feel both the deep bond that forms between them and the pang of inevitable loss that comes along with it.

Other strong performances come from Jason Schwartzman (almost unrecognizable in body padding and makeup) as a queer compatriot and confidant of Lee’s, and Manville (also almost unrecognizable under her character’s visual design) as the doctor-turned-shaman who serves as gatekeeper on his quest for psychedelic enlightenment; the always-winning Drew Droege also scores in a memorable supporting turn. 

As for the direction, Guadagnino is at his best, guiding the actors through the story with insight and specificity while making sure his film gives them the best visual showcase to deliver it. Beautifully shot in a lush color palette on sumptuously designed sets, and composed with the visual eloquence of a painterly sensibility from start to finish, “Queer” very much evokes the big screen Technicolor aesthetic of the 1950s era in which it takes place, an effect that’s both reinforced by its romanticized international settings and jarringly contrasted by an anachronistic soundtrack that includes not only a distinctly contemporary-sounding score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross but numerous songs by artists like Nirvana, Prince, and New Order.

Yet excellent as it is, it’s a film that might disappoint some viewers. Though its name and its primary characters are queer, the “queerness” of the story has ultimately nothing to do with sexuality; for Burroughs, it was perhaps the way he saw through the madness of the world that set him apart from others, that kept him feeling alone in a crowd unless it was made up of the fellow “freaks” who were among his close circle. While “Queer” certainly offers plenty of celebratory, sex-positive scenes of intimacy, conveying a truth that the author knew first-hand, it also goes to the dark side, portraying Burroughs’s Gonzo lifestyle – including explicit scenes of drug use and seemingly endless appetite for alcohol – in all its matter-of-fact squalor. Some commentators have already pointed out the story’s echo of an old narrative trope, a “Death in Venice” style story of an aging gay man lured to despair by an obsession with a beautiful youth. If you’re after positive queer representation – or at least the generally expected kind – you’re not going to find that here, either.

Still, while such things may disturb our assumptions about what queer life – or any type of life, for that matter – is “supposed” to look like, they nevertheless represent a true lived experience, and truth is sometimes just as important as presentation. And “Queer” gives us plenty of beautiful moments, too, offsetting the ugly ones and often even turning them into something beautiful, too. That’s why, while it may not be the kind of inspirational call to arms many of us feel we need right now, it still earns our recommendation as one of the standout films of the year.

In today’s world, it’s difficult to imagine that an opera singer could achieve the kind of international fame and popularity enjoyed by modern musical artists like Lady Gaga or Taylor Swift, yet that is exactly what Maria Callas did.

Possessed of a singular, inimitable, and often controversial vocal talent, she rose to the height of her profession and became a world-class artist, performing on international stages and moving within a circle that included the wealthiest, most influential and powerful people of her era. Her private life, which included a long-running affair with mega-rich Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis and a reputation for temperament that matched or exceeded expectation for a diva of her stature, was the stuff of gossip columns, and her stature as an artist was such that any scandals that might have arisen there had little impact on her reputation for the millions of fans who adored her.

Even now, nearly 50 years after her untimely death (she was only 53) in 1977, her name is still spoken with reverence among those who belong to the still-potent “cult of personality” that made her an object of near-worship, and even if you’re not an opera fan, a listen to any of the magnificent recordings she left as her legacy is enough to help you understand why. Not only did the woman have a gift for singing, she had a way of inhabiting the music she sang so completely that it seemed to belong solely to her, as if it came fully formed into the world through her own being, no matter how many other great vocalists had sung it before.

Yet the Callas we meet in Pablo Larrain’s “Maria,” a speculative biographical fantasia about the final week in the diva’s tumultuous life that premiered in competition for the prestigious “Golden Lion” award at the 2024 Venice film festival and drops on Netflix Dec. 13 following a limited theatrical release, is but a comparative shadow of that once-renowned formidable persona. Her health failing, her voice diminished, and her mind drifting between morose contemplation of her decline and drug-addled delusions of returning to her former glory, she holds a reclusive and tenuous dominion over her Paris apartment, engaged in a power struggle with her overprotective house servants and stubbornly ignoring doctor’s orders by pushing herself to regain the transcendent voice that had brought her success, fame, and a personal power that had helped her endure the traumas of a childhood in the Axis-occupied Greece of World War II.

That’s just on the surface, however. As rendered by Angelina Jolie in a career-topping performance, the Callas of “Maria” feels fully worthy of the still-imperious demeanor she wields against the world. Far from surrendering to the tragic downward spiral into which she has become entangled, she shines from within with a courageous – which is not the same thing as “fearless” – sense of self that infuses her seemingly desperate efforts to reclaim her former glory (for herself, at least, if not for public approval) and makes her story a tale of self-actualization rather than the tragic “dance with death” it might appear to be through a surface perspective.

After all, in Larrain’s vision (and the exquisitely nuanced screenplay by Steven Knight), Callas is seeking not to recapture her fame and fortune – those are hers for life, already – but to reclaim her voice. As plainly shown by the life told in bold strokes via the flashbacks interwoven throughout the film, music has been the means for Callas to overcome the oppression of men and assert personal power over her own life. From the fascist soldiers to whom she was “pimped out” in her youth by her mother to the coarse-but-doting plutocrats that have attempted to “possess” her in adulthood, she has maintained agency over them all through the gift of her vocal talent. Now, with full knowledge and acceptance that the final chapter of her life is being written, she has chosen to hold the pen firmly in her hand, asserting ownership over her own life by composing the end of its narrative for herself. It’s an unconventional path that she chooses, but how many truly great spirits ever settle for being conventional?

Whether or not she was ultimately victorious in this goal – either in her real life or in Larrain’s imagined rendering of it – might be something viewers have to decide for themselves. It’s hardly the point, however; what “Maria” conveys, more than any definitive truth about its legendary subject, is a suggestion that what matters is the fight, not the winning of it, and that perhaps the “win” is in the fight itself. Beyond that, it finds a metaphor in the diva’s willing descent into hallucinatory fantasy for engaging in a direct relationship with that part of our own nature that feels divine – one which manifests itself in our lives through many forms, be it a character in a centuries-old opera, an imagined collaboration with the long-dead composer who created it, or a fresh-faced TV interviewer (who may or not be real) with a knack for asking the questions you don’t want to answer.

The element that has sparked the most buzz about Larrain’s film, of course, is the work of its star. Jolie, who trained to sing opera for seven months in preparation for the role (though she lip-syncs to recordings of the real Callas in flashbacks of the diva’s career highlights, it is her own voice we hear when she sings in the “present-day” scenes), doubtless brings some of her own experience to the table as a successful woman whose artistic triumphs always seem less important in the public eye than her personal relationships with men.

If so, it works beyond expectation, resulting in an old-school Hollywood star turn that dazzles us with its commitment to finding a human truth behind the veneer of glamour and moves us with the raw, unfiltered emotion she masterfully underplays throughout. Oscar talk is cheap, this early in “Awards Season,” but look for this performance to be a hot contender for a nod, and perhaps even a win.

Yet even if she’s the main attraction, “Maria” boasts plenty of excellence all around, from a superb supporting cast to the luminous cinematography of Edward Lachman, which bathes the movie’s sumptuous interiors in a palette of stained-glass colors to conjure the bittersweet nostalgia for a beautiful world as it slips away into oblivion. Knight’s intelligent script, crafted with the literary eloquence of a play, explores multiple facets of the diva’s life, while using it as a springboard into a meditation on loss, letting go, and embracing our own mortality even as we strive to touch the immortal. Finally, though, it’s Larrain’s direction that ties it all together, crafting a visually gorgeous, palpably intimate film that nevertheless delves deeply into some of the grandest aspects of our existence.

For opera lovers, of course, it’s a must-see. For the rest of us, it’s still a fascinating and deeply affecting film, addressing matters of life and death as vast as the ones that drove the timeless musical masterworks in which Callas made her name.

As soon as Thanksgiving is behind us, it’s time to look forward to another crop of holiday movies, and this year offers some excellent ones – though most of them seem to have very little to do with the season itself. Unfortunately, after the last year or so, when the number of queer-themed and queer-inclusive holiday films seemed to be increasing, this year’s selection is notably short on queer representation. Of course, with a couple of exceptions, they’re also notably short on seasonal cheer, too. Nevertheless, there are several promising gems headed to theaters over the next month, all of which should be of interest to any movie fan, queer or not, and the Blade is ready to break them down for you.

WICKED (Now in theaters) Our first preview also serves as a mini-review, since it jumped the holiday queue for an early release, but that’s OK, because it turns out we needed it more than we knew. The first installment of director John M. Chu’s much-anticipated two-part adaptation of the Broadway phenomenon, in turn based on the eponymous book by queer author Gregory Maguire’s book of the same name, stars Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande as the two iconic witches of Frank Baum’s classic “Wizard of Oz” (Elphaba, the formerly anonymous “Wicked Witch of the West” as named by Maguire in his novel, and Glinda, the “Good Witch of the North,” respectively), and, without hyperbole, truly surpasses all expectation. Expanding the stage version’s Disney-ish whimsy (reinforced by its catchy song score from “Pocahontas” composer Stephen Schwartz) by incorporating elements from Maguire’s novel to bring additional gravitas (and timely relevance) to the family-friendly fun while showcasing the amazing, no-expense-spared artistry of the film’s visual design. Played out on elaborate real-life sets by a uniformly superb cast – which also features out gay “Bridgerton” heartthrob Jonathan Bailey, Oscar-winner Michelle Yeoh, veteran screen eccentric Jeff Goldblum, “Game of Thrones” star Peter Dinklage, and queer “SNL” stalwart Bowen Yang, among many other talented performers – it is that rare stage-to-screen transition that not only captures the appeal of the show that inspired it, but enhances its magic by embracing a purely cinematic expression in doing so. Add the sweet irony that can be found in the post-election success of a musical fantasy about a marginalized woman being persecuted for daring to speak truth to an authoritarian power (who also happens to be an incompetent charlatan), and you have a film that is easily the movie of the year and then some. Something tells us that Baum would be proud of what his clever little satire of American “exceptionalism” has come to inspire more than a century later. If you haven’t seen it already, what are you waiting for? Get on your broom and head straight to the next available showing at your local multiplex.

GLADIATOR II (Now in theaters) Also crashing into the arena ahead of the holidays is Ridley Scott’s sequel to his Oscar-winning original “Gladiator” from 2000, which won Oscars for Best Picture and Best Actor (Russell Crowe) among multiple other honors. The queer appeal here lies mostly in the hunkiness of its stars – allies and queer-fan-favorite heartthrobs Paul Mescal and Pedro Pascal, who join Denzel Washington as the big-name-triumvirate that drives the film – but that doesn’t mean there’s not plenty of big-budget sword-and-sandal excitement to entertain anybody with an appetite for such things; and let’s face it, as cheesy as they are, who doesn’t love a movie about barely dressed muscle men swinging swords at each other in the midst of Roman depravity? Revered queer British thespian Derek Jacobi reprises his role from the original film, among a cast that also includes Joseph Quinn, Fred Hechinger, Lior Raz, and Connie Nielsen.

QUEER (now in limited theaters, wide release 12/13) From Italian filmmaker Luca Guadagnino – the man responsible for “Call Me By Your Name” and this year’s earlier bi-triangle tennis romance “Challengers” – comes this eagerly anticipated adaptation of a semi-autobiographical novella by queer “beat generation” icon William S. Burroughs, set in 1950, in which an American expatriate (Daniel Craig in a reportedly career-topping performance) trolls the local bars looking for connection and becomes enamored with a former soldier (Drew Starkey) who is new in town. Already controversial (in some circles, at least) for its explicitness and its unapologetically raw perspective – an unsurprising element, considering that Burroughs’s legendary status as an author and personality has more to do with his countercultural radicalism than his queerness – this one is probably the standout must-see title of the season for LGBTQ audiences, or at least those not completely transfixed by “Wicked.” And although Craig (who is no stranger to “playing gay”) has said in a recent interview that his character’s sexuality is the “least interesting thing” about him, we’ll wager that millions of queer fans will disagree. Also featuring the incomparable Lesley Manville (most recently an MVP in Ryan Murphy’s “Grotesquerie”), Jason Schwartzman, Henrique Zaga, and Omar Apollo.

MARIA (in theaters 11/27, Netflix 12/11) For the opera-loving crowd comes this widely touted biopic starring Angelina Jolie as legendary soprano Maria Callas, which covers the diva’s final days when she was living as a virtual recluse in Paris. The third and final film in Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larraín’s cinematic trilogy about the lives of important 20th century women (after 2016’s “Jackie” and 2021’s “Spencer”), this one competed for the Golden Lion prize at this year’s Venice Film Festival, where it sparked Oscar buzz for Jolie’s tour-de-force turn as the operatic icon.

NIGHTBITCH (in theaters 12/6) Queer viewers can dive into their feminist allyship with this body-horror-ific drama about an artist (Amy Adams) whose role as wife and mother (to a towheaded toddler) triggers a canine-esque transformation, complete with an enhanced sense of smell, unexpected body hair, and extra nipples on her belly. A metaphoric exploration of discovering personal power and transcending cultural expectations defining womanhood around traditional roles of homemaker and mother, it will undoubtedly spark complaints from the anti-”woke” crowd, which obviously scores points with us, every time.

THE ORDER (in theaters 12/6) There’s nothing specifically queer about this one, which stars Jude Law as a veteran FBI agent who confronts a zealous white supremacist rebel leader (Nicholas Hoult) in a “war for America’s soul,” but there are obvious points of connection in its fictionalized “what-if” fantasia based on 1980s headlines about the Aryan Nation spinoff group “The Order” and its campaign of robberies, bombings and murder. If you’re not a fan of Nazis (because no matter what they happen to call themselves, a Nazi is still a Nazi), this one is probably for you.

NICKEL BOYS (in theaters 12/13) Allyship is also the draw from this lengthy adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer-winning bestseller, starring Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor as a hotel housekeeper whose grandson (Ethan Herisse) is unjustly incarcerated in a reformatory during the “Jim Crow” era. Directed by Peabody Award winner (and Emmy and Oscar nominee) RaMell Ross, this anti-racist drama is based on a true story.

THE ROOM NEXT DOOR (in theaters 12/20) If any upcoming movie deserves a spotlight it’s this one, the first English-language feature by iconic queer Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar, in which a pair of former New York magazine colleagues (Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore) reunite after many years when one of them is faced with a terminal cancer diagnosis and asks the other to help her “die with dignity.” With three such transcendent artists uniting to collaborate, our confidence level is elevated enough for us to suggest that this might be the highlight of the season for lovers of pure cinema.

BETTER MAN (in theaters 12/25) If you’ve never heard of Robbie Williams (and you’re an American), you can be forgiven, since the phenomenally successful pop singer-songwriter from the UK is a relatively unknown sensation on this side of the Atlantic, but this unorthodox musical biopic from “Greatest Showman” director Michael Gracey looks to be an introduction you’ll never forget. Depicting the well-publicized ups and downs of Williams’ personal life as it traces his rise to fame and beyond, it also depicts him as a chimpanzee – voiced by Williams himself and portrayed through CG motion capture by Jonno Davies – because, as the Brit-pop icon puts it, “I’ve always felt less evolved” than other people. It sounds odd, sure, but its September debut at the Telluride Film Festival was met with enthusiastic critical acclaim, and whether it works for you or not, it surely boasts the most unusual premise of any film this year that we’re aware of.

BABYGIRL (in theaters 12/25) Another unusual choice for Christmastime is this provocative erotic thriller from writer/director Halina Reijn, starring Nicole Kidman as a CEO who has become sexually bored with her husband (Antonio Banderas) and pursues an affair with a much-younger male intern (the incandescently beautiful Harris Dickinson), which weaves a steamy cautionary tale about the treacherous dynamics of power and sexuality within a professional setting. Another Golden Lion contender at Venice, it’s garnered heavy praise both for Reijn’s direction and Kidman’s performance; so while it may not be the kind of family-friendly holiday film you’ll want to see with mom and dad, it’s definitely one worth sneaking out for on a solo excursion while the rest of the family is sleeping off that holiday meal.

NOSFERATU (in theaters 12/25) Even less appropriate for the holiday season (unless the holiday is Halloween) but eagerly awaited nonetheless, this remake of F.W. Murnau’s venerable silent classic – a 1922 German Expressionist masterpiece based on Bram Stoker’s “Dracula” that is widely seen as the “granddaddy” of all vampire films – from always-buzzy filmmaker Robert Eggers (“The Witch,” “The Lighthouse”) is probably the perfect refresher after a month of cheer, festivities, sweetness, and light. Starring Bill Saarsgård as the sinister Count Orlok, with Nicholas Hoult and Lily-Rose Depp as the couple whose lives he infiltrates and Willem Dafoe as the professor who becomes his nemesis, it brings the gothic tale “into the 21st century” (says Eggers) and emphasizes the twisted obsessions and infatuations that tie its characters together. Long-delayed and much-anticipated, this one is already a guaranteed must-see for anyone who loves the genre – so if you need a seasonal connection, you can always think of it as a holiday gift for horror fans.