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Miriam Margolyes & Stephen Fry Set For LGBTQ+ Short

Exclusive: Miriam Margolyes (Harry Potter franchise) will lead upcoming British short film A Friend of Dorothy, with Stephen Fry (Wilde), Alistair Nwachukwu and Oscar Lloyd (Stranger Things: The First Shadow) also starring. The film, which shot at The Charterhouse in London and a private home in Kensington & Chelsea, follows the titular Dorothy (Margolyes), an elderly woman living alone who unexpectedly strikes up a friendship with young neighbor JJ (Nwachukwu) when his football lands in her garden. It explores themes of loneliness in old age, intergenerational friendship and LGBTQ+ issues. Pic is the writing and directorial debut of actor Lee Knight, who also serves as executive producer. He is best known for appearing opposite to Ian McKellen in Prime Video’s Hamlet and for roles in two Harry Potter films. His Filthy Gorgeous Productions is making the short, in association with A Marlow’s Production,...

In Young Hearts, 14-year-old Elias (Lou Goossens) sees his seemingly idyllic life in the Belgian countryside crack when another boy around the same age, Alexander (Marius De Saeger), moves in across the street. Elias is immediately drawn to Alexander, whose insouciance with regard to all things queer both puzzles and marvels Elias. At one point, after cycling through the countryside, as they eat cherries by a lake, Alexander responds to Elias’s questions about his relationship status, telling him that he was in one with a boy last year.

The film wallows in a fantasy of Northern European rurality where childhood freedom is granted by hands-off parenting and bicycles that never need to be locked. In this world, going to school involves biking past comely cows and heavenly fruit stands, and pit stops to hold piglets and swim naked in a pond. Here the worst act of bullying comes in...

At first glance, Young Hearts seems to resemble Lukas Dhont’s Close — in its rural Belgian town setting and its focus on two early teenage boys navigating the tricky boundaries between friendship and romance. But closer acquaintance reveals Flemish filmmaker Anthony Schatteman’s first feature to be something more in line with Heartstopper or Love, Simon, entirely without the tragic dimensions of Dhont’s Oscar-nominated drama. Impressive newcomer Lou Goossens plays a 14-year-old boy thrown into emotional confusion by his attraction to a new neighbor in a film whose queer positivity should be a balm to LGBTQ kids wrestling with their sexuality as well as to parents struggling with acceptance.

That doesn’t mean the usual conflicts of brooding isolation, initial rejection and fear of stigmatization are absent. But one of the chief selling points of Young Hearts is its sincere depiction of coming out in a supportive environment, unfolding...

"No parking in the red zone!" Ha ha. Samuel Goldwyn Films has revealed an official US trailer for an action movie from Belgium (in the Dutch language) titled Hazard, also stylized as H4Z4RD during its original premiere. This first opened in 2022 in Belgium, and hit the genre festivals in late 2023 playing at Fantastic Fest, FrightFest, and Sitges last year. It's hard to describe: Noah really loves his girlfriend, his daughter, and his car, but he gets involved in a deadly driving job that will result in either losing his life, his family or his beloved car. It's a car movie, and an action movie, rolled into one - and the title comes from the guy's name, Noah Hazard - starring superstar DJ Dimitri 'Vegas' Thivaios. The cast also includes Jeroen Perceval, Jennifer Heylen, Mila Rooms, Frank Lammers, Monic Hendrickx, Tom Vermeir, Emilie De Roo, and Gene Bervoets. Looks like it...

This coming-of-age drama gently probes the insecurities experienced by a teenager as he explores his sexuality while, thankfully, not representing him as some sort of tragic figure as is still so frequently the case in cinema. It may be a little sentimental at the edges, but the heart of Anthony Schatteman’s film is in the right place.

Elias lives with his mum (Emilie De Roo), dad (Geert Van Rampelberg) and older brother in the Dutch countryside. Life is fairly unremarkable, save for the fact his dad is a semi-famous singer. Generally speaking, Elias kicks about with his gang of pals, including his sort-of girlfriend Valerie (Saar Rogiers) in between visits to the farm his grandad (Dirk Van Dijck) owns.

Into this mix arrives Alexander (Marius De Saeger), a new neighbour from...

Berlin-based Films Boutique has boarded Anthony Schatteman’s Young Hearts, which world premieres next month in the Berlinale’s Generation Kplus strand.

Young Hearts centres on a 13-year-old boy who feels attracted to his new neighbour. The film marks the directorial debut of Belgian director Anthony Schatteman and won the work in progress award at Connext 2023. Schatteman most recently directed the Irish series Northern Lights for Lionsgate. His youth series Panna was released in 2021, airing on Goplay.be for Sbs Belgium, and his series 2de Zit played Belgian streaming platform Streamz.

Young Hearts’ stars Lou Goossens, Marius De Saeger, Geert Van Rampelberg,...

"It's not about money. It's about people." Netflix has revealed the new official trailer for a series titled Soil, made in and produced in Belgium, but primarily about a Moroccan community in the country. Here's the setup for this dark comedy series: If a Muslim person passes away in Belgium, he burdens his relatives with a delicate dilemma: "Do we bury him here or in his native country?" Ishmael, better known as "Smile", has devised a solution: "What if we import soil from Morocco into Belgium to bury our deceased?" But without realising it, he's opening Pandora's 'coffin'. Ha. This originally premiered on TV in Belgium last year, and is coming to Netflix soon for everyone else to watch. The main cast includes actors Yassine Ouaich, Charlotte De Bruyne, Barbara Sarafian, Tom Vermeir, Saïd Boumazoughe, Mourade Zeguendi, Ahlaam Teghadouini, Dries Heyneman, Ward Kerremans, Emilie De Roo and Wannes Cappelle. This is clever!