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Ben Turner
Tomatometer-approved critic
A critic and film historian of LGBT+ cinema, Ben Turner is the founder of The Pink Lens. In a career dedicated to the representation of Queer people, he seeks to highlight the films that get it right and the films that don't.
Movies reviews only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
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Unicorns (2023) |
A well-crafted genre movie that can comfortably rest on the talent of its actors, who instil a giant beating heart at the centre of this very watchable film. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Jul 07, 2024
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Challengers (2024) |
Challengers might not be the tennis movie you expect, but it’s the tennis movie Guadagnino wanted us to see and we are totally here for that. Tense, sharp and extremely sexy, it tastes just as delicious as it looks. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Jul 07, 2024
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Drive-Away Dolls (2024) |
A mediocre place-holder that will be remembered as a Coen Miss, not a Coen Hit - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Jul 07, 2024
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Birder (2023) |
As an erotic thriller it focuses more on the erotic, but even that is somewhat undermined by the silliness of romping about in the buff. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Jul 07, 2024
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The Mattachine Family (2023) |
Rose-tinted and saccharine sweet, its hyper-realistic style is tainted by a drenching of idealised nostalgia that leaves this contemplative mumblecore somewhat lacking any real substance. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Jul 07, 2024
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Nimona (2023) |
It has fight after battle after skirmish after fight, which is certainly exciting but feels somewhat formulaic. But then, what else could possibly happen in a futuristic medieval kingdom? - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Aligned (2023) |
As an unabashed and unashamed piece of homoeroticism, this delivers in spades. Just don’t kid yourself that you need to watch it with the sound on. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Monster (2023) |
A shrewd and edgy social commentary, this is an intelligent and contemplative film played out through pithy dialogue and arresting visuals. This is Japanese filmmaking at its absolute best. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Orlando, My Political Biography (2023) |
An overwrought academic slice of virtue-signalling, this is a very difficult film to sit through. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Silver Haze (2023) |
Stark, bleak and painfully true, this is the tragic story of how one broken person cannot heal another. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Maisie (2021) |
On the one hand, this is a celebration of a bygone era, when drag queens were about big hair, sequins and innuendo. On the other, this is a warts-and-all observational doc that morbidly examines loneliness and mental decline. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Carnal Sins (2023) |
This certainly isn’t accessible horror, but it certainly serves an unsettling slice of nuanced and unpleasant suspense. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Monica (2022) |
It may not be the snappiest film in the world, but what it lacks in haste it makes up for in characterisation. Though we spend a good portion watching the family simply function by itself, Lysette has anchored this film with a giant beating heart. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Eileen (2023) |
A dreary yet dramatic film that doesn’t quite live up to its potential, it suffers from being annoyingly uneven, with a titular character that we care very little for. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Opponent (2023) |
A nuanced and affecting drama centred on a deeply compound character, this is a moving portrait of the complexities of asylum. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Norwegian Dream (2023) |
The boys are certainly endearing enough and watching their chemistry makes for charming viewing, but this is well-trod territory. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Monkey Man (2024) |
For a generation brought up on RPGs, this will feel like familiar territory, but for those looking for a little more finesse, this is a very loud and brash film that lacks the subtlety of a finer crafted work. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Love Lies Bleeding (2024) |
This is all about strength, but deeply flawed strength, where vanity is the Achilles heel. Adrenaline-filled and breathlessly stylish, this is a very strong period flick that feels like a twenty-first century Bound. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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Our Son (2023) |
Serious, sober and sensibly intense, this is an unfrivolous and restrained drama that doesn’t quite have the emotive gut-punch that you might expect for a film about a broken home. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted May 30, 2024
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The Teacher (2020) |
There’s a lot of subtlety to the film, but in trying to remain nuanced it has ended up over-restrained. The result is a film that competently makes its point, but does so politely and without making a fuss. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Mar 07, 2024
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The Lost Boys (2023) |
Dark, gritty and filled with hopelessness, this is a tragic and sad coming-of-age movie that turns the genre on its head. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Feb 07, 2024
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Every Body (2023) |
The film makes much of the importance of visibility, ensuring that the public understands and can see real intersex people in the media. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Feb 07, 2024
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Down Low (2023) |
Crammed with laughs across a delightfully stupid story, this is a fun film with great performances let down by absurdist plotting. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Feb 07, 2024
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Bottoms (2023) |
Yes, this looks and smells and feels like an American high school, but this is absurdism first and foremost. I think we can safely say that both Seligman and Sennott firmly have our attention. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Feb 07, 2024
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Good Grief (2023) |
It might not roll out the belly laughs, but it will certainly make you chuckle even while you’re emoting deeply. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Feb 07, 2024
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The Color Purple (2023) |
If you're not watching it in a vacuum... well you can't help but see its cracks, but if you are? Prepare to have your socks blown off. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Feb 07, 2024
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All of Us Strangers (2023) |
Restrained, nuanced and deeply affecting, this is one of the very best LGBT+ movies - or any movies for that matter - released in the last decade. This is a shattering story and in fact, I would wager, a truly perfect film. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Feb 07, 2024
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Nuovo Olimpio (2023) |
Dreamy, passionate and exceptionally serious, this decades-long romance is underserved by its over-generous helping. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Exteriors (2023) |
The stories are bland and meandering, feeling inconsequential and flat. Without music or tension, these are just banal duologues that feel like a screenwriter just wrote three extended scenes and couldn’t be bothered to find a story to fit them into. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Eismayer (2022) |
The story might be simple but the characters are expansive, with both of its leads delivering the kind of knock-out performances that Hollywood can only wish for sometimes. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Rustin (2023) |
It’s clear that Bayard Rustin is a figure worthy of the biopic treatment, but the film has ended up an American movie for an American audience that hasn’t translated well to an international one. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Saltburn (2023) |
With excellent acting, arresting visuals and art direction to die for, this is one of the most original movies to be released in years. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Femme (2023) |
This is a perfect genre movie, delivering every aspect of an erotic thriller with aplomb. Dark, sumptuous, chilling and sexy, this is a delectable watch and the kind of movie that is so rarely made nowadays. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Nyad (2023) |
With a wholly conventional narrative and very few hiccups along the way, it does feel like a dramatisation without much of a purpose. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Fanfic (2023) |
Unfortunately it suffers from a narrative that really has been played out countless times before. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Queendom (2023) |
"A remarkable film that weave empowerment with unsettling tension and artistry with pure barbarism. It is by far the most affecting documentary of the year." - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Dec 08, 2023
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Rock Hudson: All That Heaven Allowed (2023) |
Taking a flaws-and-all exposé approach, the film isn’t afraid to open the door of his closet so we can really see the man whose death had as much of a legacy as his life. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Nov 09, 2023
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20,000 Species of Bees (2023) |
The story is strong enough to make this a compelling and emotive piece, but it could easily have been improved by an editor strong enough to hem this neatly around its fraying edges. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Nov 09, 2023
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Golden Delicious (2022) |
Well-made and entertaining teenage idealism that does a sturdy job at depicting the modern experience of a sexual awakening. Teen audiences will lap this up, but for those well-versed in the coming-of-age genre, this is fairly tepid fayre. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Nov 09, 2023
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Strange Way of Life (2023) |
Atmospheric, cinematic and beautiful, the plot is simple but the characters complex. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Nov 09, 2023
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Passages (2023) |
A brilliantly acted and sparingly composed film that succeeds in bringing this extraordinary issue politely to the screen with real emotional intelligence. This is unquestionably Sachs’ best film to date. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Nov 09, 2023
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Cassandro (2023) |
Flamboyant, camp and so far over the top he’s skated down the other side, Cassandro is a fascinating figure ripe for the biopic treatment. But lucha libre is unlikely to find any new fans off the back of this mediocre film. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Nov 09, 2023
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Punch (2022) |
Drenched in the cold light of the seashore, these two opposites find themselves in each other. And alongside them, we fall in love with them both. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Nov 09, 2023
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Loud & Longing (2023) |
With a cast of characters from every gender, sexuality and race together, this is a veritable smorgasbord of rainbow diversity. But for all the film’s honourable intentions, these are underserved by its drearily flat execution. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Oct 07, 2023
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Eldorado: Everything the Nazis Hate (2023) |
In giving the story of Queer people in the Holocaust a focus, this documentary surmounts the scale of the Holocaust by giving it a clutch of human faces. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Oct 07, 2023
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Elephant (2022) |
A film that tries to cast a romance against the backdrop of homophobia in rural Poland, this is a slow and uninteresting plod that’s improved only by the introduction of a fine young actor to the world. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Oct 07, 2023
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The Latent Image (2022) |
It’s clever, it’s smug and it never quite lets us have the pay-off it was dangling before us. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Oct 07, 2023
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Rotting in the Sun (2023) |
We’ve become so used to high-spec filmmaking that this rough and raw indie curveball has gleefully smashed through our Everest window to draw our attention to this spicy, hot mess. And we are totally here ready for it. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Oct 07, 2023
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The Queen of My Dreams (2023) |
ilmic, delectable and rewarding, this is accomplished and accessibly adult filmmaking, telling a rich story through the eyes of a director who’s both worldly wise and scrumptiously innovative. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Oct 07, 2023
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Love in Country (2023) |
If you’re looking for a sweeping love story cast against the backdrop of visceral war, this is not that film. It has all the right components, but budget constraints and a lack of talent have left this just a box ticking exercise. Gay war movie? Tick. - The Pink Lens
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| Posted Oct 07, 2023
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