Com­ing Out: Six great sex­u­al awak­en­ings in the movies

The term ​“moffie” is South African in ori­gin and is one of the most aggres­sive and offen­sive slang terms for gay per­son. It is the provoca­tive name of the new film by direc­tor Oliv­er Her­manus, a sto­ry of pri­vate sex­u­al­i­ty fac­ing off against pub­lic hatred. It sees well-off Nicholas (Kai Luke Brum­mer) fly­ing the fam­i­ly coop to com­plete his mil­i­tary ser­vice, which includes active ser­vice on the bor­der with Angola.

The air of machis­mo is expect­ed, but he quick­ly dis­cov­ers that there’s a zero tol­er­ance pol­i­cy towards any behav­iour that might be seen as sex­u­al­ly deviant. If such behav­iour is wit­nessed, it’s pun­ish­able first by extreme humil­i­a­tion and degra­da­tion, and then a course of ruth­less med­ical cor­rec­tion. But amid the hor­rors that Nicholas wit­ness­es is his bur­geon­ing love for a fel­low recruit. At the cen­tre of the film is a flash­back to one of Nicholas’ for­ma­tive sex­u­al expe­ri­ences, as he acci­den­tal­ly finds him­self watch­ing men tak­ing a show­er at an out­door swim­ming pool.

Here are some oth­er exam­ples of films in which char­ac­ters are seen com­ing to terms with – and embrac­ing – sex­u­al­i­ty in all man­ner of dif­fer­ent ways.

First it was a break­through but soon it became a behe­moth: Bar­ry Jenk­ins’ screen adap­ta­tion of Tarell Alvin McCraney’s ​‘In Moon­light Black Boys Look Blue’ is an indie com­ing-of-age sto­ry that went on to secure Oscar gold. This three-part tale depicts three chap­ters in the life of Chi­ron, and it charts the frac­tious rela­tion­ship with his own sex­u­al­i­ty: from con­fused ini­tial pangs in the first chap­ter; to a sud­den real­i­sa­tion in the sec­ond; then roman­tic accep­tance in the third.

This won­der­ful, lilt­ing 1950s-set romance is based on a nov­el by Patri­cia High­smith called ​‘The Price of Salt’ and it offers a sub­lime show­case for its two lead­ing ladies: Cate Blanchett (in the title role), and Rooney Mara (as the smit­ten ingénue, Therese). We see the microsec­ond their eyes meet, across the shop floor of a New York depart­ment store over the hol­i­day sea­son, where Car­ol is look­ing to pur­chase a train set for her son, and Therese is more than will­ing to help her out. It’s a moment of pure elec­tric­i­ty, but one which direc­tor Todd Haynes doesn’t milk for undue emotion.

It’s crazy to think that Stephen Frears’ queer clas­sic My Beau­ti­ful Laun­drette is 35 years old, as its sto­ry of wide-eyed Pak­istani odd-job­ber, Omar (Gor­don War­necke), and his love affair with a cock­ney punk named John­ny (Daniel Day-Lewis) has lost none of its provoca­tive edge. Omar is tend­ing a run-down laun­drette run by a father’s wheel­er-deal­ing friends, when one day John­ny comes by, and the pair have an instant con­nec­tion. So much so, we soon dis­cov­er that their rela­tion­ship began dur­ing their school days – before it was interrupted.

This eye-scorch­ing and out­ra­geous camp clas­sic is set in a gay reha­bil­i­ta­tion camp run by Ru Paul among oth­ers, and whose stu­dents are all sus­pect­ed by over­ly con­ser­v­a­tive par­ents to be sex­u­al deviants. The entire film is about cheer girl Megan (Natasha Lyonne) and her long, slow but ulti­mate­ly tran­scen­dent real­i­sa­tion about who she real­ly is, coaxed from her with the help of fel­low inductee, Gra­ham (Clea DuVall).

Some­times, com­ing out of the clos­est is not some­thing you attend to in your for­ma­tive years. What about if you’re trapped in there until your senior years? Begin­ners, by writer/​director Mike Mills, deals with one such sit­u­a­tion, as Ewen McGregor’s Oliv­er casts his mind back over the five years pri­or to his father, Hal’s, death, and his late-game but full-force embrace of his true sex­u­al­i­ty. The film is a bit­ter­sweet com­e­dy that cel­e­brates the notion of liv­ing life in your true skin, even if just for a rel­a­tive­ly short while.

The first LGBT+-themed film to come out of Kenya (in 2018) tells of two teenage girls from dif­fer­ent sides of the tracks: first there’s lanky tomboy Kena, who has a bright future as a nurse tee’d up; and there’s Ziki, a glam­orous and sex­u­al­ly for­ward latchkey girl who just wan­ders around town just enjoy­ing her­self. They keep run­ning into one anoth­er, soon they start talk­ing, one thing leads to anoth­er, and then… boom. The film, by direc­tor Wanuri Kahiu, remains banned in its home state.

Moffie is avail­able to stream now via Cur­zon Home Cin­e­ma.