Sapphic Movies to Watch for Pride Month 👩❤️💋👩🏳️🌈
But I’m A Cheerleader (1999)
I have to start with my favourite unapologetically gay movie. When a cheerleader, Megan, gets sent to a conversion camp because she eats tofu. She comes to term with her sexuality in the worst possible place, but the film ensures to show that these teens are exposed to gay culture as well, when the group sneak out to a local gay bar, finally seeing that their desires aren’t bad, but accepted when you are with the right people who care about you. It is worth noting that while this is an exaggerated and dramatic version of conversion therapy, it is still conversion therapy. All of the people there are forced to do gendered work, with the methods becoming more intrusive in each chapter, with the final step of the program being “simulated sexual lifestyle” 🤢. Megan is also played by Natasha Lyonne who gets gayer with every project she is in and that in itself is incredible.
T.W. Conversion therapy, homophobia, f-slur, d-slur, toxic families and abandonment
The Handmaiden (2016)
If all crime movies were this gay, I might actually watch them. A film in two acts follows the attempts to rob a wealthy woman by a man seducing her, eloping with her, and then leaving her to die. To convince the woman to fall in love he sends in a thief to act as her maid for a cut of the profits. There is so much to say about how incredible this film is. Plot twists, slow-burn romance, betrayal, and most importantly, a happy ending. I can assure you right now, our beautiful lesbians do not die in this film. I am so sick of death used only for dramatic effect or shock value. The film's first act follows Sookee, a thief, who takes on the name Tamako when she works as a maid and is instantly blown away by how beautiful her Lady, Hideko, is. The second act tells the same story from Hideko’s perspective. The young, beautiful woman is used by the men in her life and will eventually be expected to marry her uncle, an arrangement she is desperate to get away from. But of course, they fall in love, and I will gush about them for as long as anybody will let me, but in doing so will spoil the film so it is time to move on.
T.W. Mental hospital, a woman hanging from a tree, discussions of suicide, attempted suicide, sexual assault, self-harm, there are also some very intense sex scenes so if you’re watching this in a shared home you know that’s when someone is walking in.
All Cheerleaders Die (2013)
A horror comedy where our gay girls in love aren’t killed. A low bar that is rarely met. When a cheerleader dies in practice her unpopular friend Mäddy joins the team to plot revenge. As Maddy disappears into her role her ex-girlfriend Leena continues to reach out to her. When the cheerleaders suffer a fatal accident, Leena brings them back with her magic using crystals to heal their wounds. There is no coming out story in this film, Mäddy and Leena start as lesbians, end as lesbians, and are never fought on the basis of their sexuality, making the effort to confirm this as the flowery romantic music grows when Mäddy and Leena come together and start working as a unit. Considering the love that films get for having a relationship between two women in subtext, the fact that this film has not become a cult classic on par with Jennifer’s Body and Ginger Snaps is nothing if not a mystery.
T.W. car crash, blood, gore, d-slur, rape, sexual assault
The Runaways (2010)
“A little Bowie, a little Bardot, and a look on your face that says: I could kick the shit out of a truck driver.”
Even if you don’t explicitly know Joan Jett or Cherie Currie you would have heard the song Cherry Bomb used in the soundtrack in so many movies and tv shows. The Runaways was the first all-female rock band with this film detailing their rise and fall during the 1970s. While the film follows the band, the focus is on Cherie Currie, played by Dakota Fanning, as she falls victim to the corruption of fame, and Joan Jett, played by Kristen Stewart, who is eternally seeking the musician she wants to be, ultimately creating the band Joan Jett and the Blackhearts. While the romantic relationships between Joan Jett and Cherie Curie were created with creative licence and based on rumours, it is a beautiful fantasy.
T.W. Drug use, rehab, f-slur, sexism and misogyny
The Half of It (2020)
The Half of It only came out a year ago and received a lot of positive response for being an incredible coming of age story about Ellie. In a conservative town, she supports her father and develops a genius business idea of writing letters to her crush and letting others sign their name for a price. She gets to stare at pretty girls and gets paid for it, is there a better job? While it is so easy to claim this as a romance, and want Ellie and Alexxis to be together (and I want them to be together) the narrative follows the structure of a coming of age story. Ellie grows more confident in herself, her family becomes fuller, and the world becomes bigger.
T.W. Death of a parent, good ol’ christian homophobia
