Considered one of the earliest positive cinematic depictions of (male) homosexuality, Carl Theodor Dreyer's Michael tells the story of lonely artist Zoret (director Benjamin Christensen), his bright young muse and model Michael (Walter Slezak), and the more mature art critic Switt (Robert Garrison). Though it's mostly suggested – there's a female temptress (Nora Gregor) assuming a heterosexual perspective – its motif of the spoken and unspoken relationship between the men is definitely one of love, much in the same way Charles Vidor's Gilda (1946) is.

“Now I may die content, for I have seen great love.”

– opening title card

Michael is the second book adaption of Herman Bang's Mikaël (1902) after Vingarne [The Wings] (Mauritz Stiller, 1916).

Where the Boys Are is chock-full of characters whose names appear to be straight space-travel-lifted from various #JohnWaters' movies: Tuggle Carpenter! TV Thompson! Lola Fandango! Dr. Raunch for Chrissakes!

“The boys come to soak up the sun, and a few carloads of beer. The girls come, very simply, because this is where the boys are.”

– narrator

We follow four female midwestern college students on #SpringBreak in Fort Lauderdale. Their objective is boys boys boys (and an even tan) and nothing, including being too young to drink, can stop them. This was one of the first post-Hayes Hollywood movies to address teenage sex yet despite all the innuendo (“What's your shoe size?” “13.” “Get in the car!”), it's all pretty clean. But without these girls, there wouldn't be any Dawn Davenport. And that would've ruined everybody's Christmas.

“I still can't figure out if it's an office, a market place, or a boxing ring. And maybe I don't even need to.”

– Vittoria

Barbara wakes up believing a fireman entered her bedroom through the window. Her father reassures her there's nothing, just a children's story. Years later, the adult Barbara (Caroline Loeb), grown up, withdrawn, living with her father (Dionys Mascolo), tutor, half brother (Pascal Greggory), and a persistent longing for her fireman, sparks a scheme that forces the fire brigade to come to their house and climb through her window once again.

“It's you.”

Flammes has a strange, stilted quality to it which reminds me, not in the least because of the presence of Geoffrey Carey as the restless American who travels with his own firefighter suit, of Raúl Ruiz's staged cinematic language. As in Ruiz's The Territory (1981), the characters drift in and out of space, and as in its half brother Der Stand der Dinge (Wim Wenders, 1982) we're left with wonderfully lingering performers who seem detached from, yet devoted to, their raison d'être.

“We'll eat Chinese. OK?”

Eva (Hedy Lamarr) hangs her clothes over her horse's back, then – cut through a wonderfully voyeuristic moment – goes swimming in a lake. The foal, still carrying Eva's outfit, wanders off to find a stallion.

Ekstase is full of not so subtle, beautifully framed innuendo. #Horses are a recurring theme and make me wonder if it inspired the mustangs sequence in John Huston's The Misfits (1961), another story of doomed passion.

A car crash on National Insurance Awareness Day (USA)

A couple rushing home at night hit a cyclist. Despite knowing that the man's still alive, they opt to leave the site of the #crash and never mention it again. News reports about the death of the cyclist cause a rupture; because of the couple's #class differences – she a wealthy socialite, he a former falange soldier turned university professor – because they're lovers, and because no one can know about their whereabouts on the night of the accident.

“He's still alive.”

Striking about Bardem's Muerte de un ciclista is its outsiderness in the Spanish film landscape. By adopting the visual language of both Italian #Neorealismo and Hollywood #melodrama, Bardem elegantly circumvents #Franco​ist censorship.