Directed by Naoko Yamada • 2018 • Japan
Starring Laurie Hymes, Stephanie Sheh, Courtney Shaw
Luminous hand-drawn animation, stirring music, and fairy-tale imagination combine in this uniquely intimate, ineffably moving coming-of-age story from renowned anime director Naoko Yamada (A SILENT VOICE). High-school bandmates Mizore and Nozomi prepare to play a complex musical duet, “Liz and the Blue Bird,” for oboe and flute. Though they play beautifully together and have been best friends since childhood, they find their relationship begins to buckle under the pressures of both rehearsals and their looming graduation. Evocatively interspersed with their story is the fantasy tale of Liz, drawn like a storybook and contrasting beautifully with the crisply-rendered realism of the school.
Up Next in Queersighted: Coming of Age
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Henry Gamble’s Birthday Party
Directed by Stephen Cone • 2015 • United States
Starring Cole Doman, Joe Keery, Elizabeth LaidlawOne of contemporary cinema’s most sensitive coming-out films, Stephen Cone’s follow-up to his acclaimed breakout feature THE WISE KIDS unfolds over the course of one very eventful day in the life of...
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The Long Day Closes
Directed by Terence Davies • 1992 • United Kingdom
Starring Leigh McCormack, Marjorie Yates, Anthony WatsonTHE LONG DAY CLOSES is the most gloriously cinematic expression of the unique sensibility of Terence Davies, widely celebrated as Britain’s greatest living filmmaker. Suffused with both en...
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Nowhere
Directed by Gregg Araki • 1997 • United States
Starring James Duval, Rachel True, Nathan BextonYou can practically smell the pheromones wafting off this kaleidoscopic odyssey, which finds director Gregg Araki crossing soap-operatic elements with blasts of science fiction, indie-kid cool, and sh...
