High Hopes (2021)

Perhaps the most amazing and groundbreaking quality about The Birdcage is how removed it is from both illness and insensitivity. Whereas films preceding it were often somber stories about the tribulations of being gay in a conservatively straight world, Nichols and screenwriter Elaine May expose the fallacies of conservatism as traditional values are thrown into a more open-minded space. They don’t care how far the community has fallen so much as how high they can rebuild themselves.

Documented human suffering is never easy to view or read about and is understandably triggering for many people, but it can be educational, and education is a key to change. An overwhelming amount queer people worldwide (and in my own country) have it far worse than I could imagine, and documentaries such as Welcome to Chechnya bring issues to light that certain groups of people would never see.

Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dame is a unique film coming from the same studio that brought us The Little Mermaid and Aladdin. While it does have its silly moments to maintain Disney’s family-friendliness, it also carries themes that stick to audiences years after its release.

April, a professional dancer, reluctantly trains a group of girls at a dance school for the dance competition.

Shudder’s Host (not a particularly original title, I must say) attempts to bring the spooks to “the quarantine generation” by presenting us with a scary Zoom call during lockdown.