The LGBTQ+ Films to Watch in the Second Half of 2026

Between July and December 2026, queer cinema takes center stage : the final chapter of Heartstopper, an erotic thriller from Gregg Araki, a war drama from Lukas Dhont, a lesbian romance starring Léa Drucker and Mélanie Thierry, and the Spanish epic La Bola Negra, crowned at Cannes. The official Queer Palm 2026 selection, which rewards the best LGBTQ+ film at the Cannes Film Festival every year, brings its own share of highly anticipated releases, as does the Teddy Award, its Berlinale counterpart, with the widely praised Rose starring Sandra Hüller. Here, in release order, are the LGBTQ+ films to follow this second half of the year.

Heartstopper Forever

This film closes the story of Nick and Charlie as a series finale. As Nick prepares to leave for university and Charlie grows more confident at school, long distance puts their relationship to the test. Netflix chose this feature film to conclude the series adapted from Alice Oseman's graphic novels.

Director : Wash Westmoreland

Cast : Kit Connor, Joe Locke

Release : July 17, 2026, on Netflix

Les Matins merveilleux (Marvelous Mornings)

Avril Besson's first feature film, presented as a Special Screening at Cannes. Charlie has just lost her grandmother and heads to the south of France to deliver a box of vinyl records to a man named Tony, as her grandmother had asked. This nostalgic, disco-tinged road trip puts her on the path of several characters, including Marina, with whom she forms a meaningful bond.

Director : Avril Besson

Cast : India Hair, Raya Martigny, Éric Cantona

Release : July 29, 2026, in theaters

I Want Your Sex

Gregg Araki delivers an erotic, satirical thriller about a generation that has forgotten how to desire. Elliot, a fresh-faced new assistant, lands a job with Erika Tracy, a provocative artist who will upend his certainties and his fantasies.

Director : Gregg Araki

Cast : Olivia Wilde, Cooper Hoffman, Charli XCX, Daveed Diggs, Mason Gooding

Release : July 29, 2026, in theaters

Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma

Winner of the 2026 Queer Palm, this new film from Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw the TV Glow) follows a queer director hired to reboot a cult slasher franchise. Obsessed with tracking down the original film's "final girl", she drags both women into a psychological spiral that is as funny as it is unsettling.

Director : Jane Schoenbrun

Cast : Hannah Einbinder, Gillian Anderson

Release : August 7, 2026, distributed by Mubi (United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Spain and other territories ; French release date not yet confirmed)

La Vie d'une femme (A Woman's Life)

Presented in competition at Cannes, this film follows Gabrielle, a surgeon heading a hospital department, whose life is upended when a young novelist, Frida, starts observing her for several weeks to research her next book. A love story between two women that focuses as much on diverging desires as on the expectations we place on a relationship.

Director : Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet

Cast : Léa Drucker, Mélanie Thierry

Release : September 9, 2026, in theaters

Rose

Selected in competition at the Berlinale, where Sandra Hüller won the Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance, this black and white film is set in the aftermath of the Thirty Years' War. A mysterious, scarred soldier settles in an isolated German village. Through hard work and favors rendered, he earns the villagers' trust and believes his secret is buried : Rose is passing as a man. But the villagers start to doubt his true identity.

Director : Markus Schleinzer

Cast : Sandra Hüller, Caro Braun, Marisa Growaldt

Release : September 9, 2026, in theaters

Garance

Presented in competition at Cannes and selected for the Queer Palm, this film from Jeanne Herry follows eight years in the life of Garance, a young actress struggling with alcoholism, made up of moves, encounters, parties and anxieties, but also an intimate, social and sexual awakening. After a string of fleeting relationships, she meets Pauline, with whom she builds a bond that is as tender as it is healing.

Director : Jeanne Herry

Cast : Adèle Exarchopoulos, Sara Giraudeau, Sarajeanne Drillaud

Release : September 23, 2026, in theaters

Les Éléphants dans la brume (Elephants in the Fog)

In a Nepalese village nestled in a forest home to wild elephants lives a kinnar community, both revered and feared for its powers of blessing and curse. Pirati, one of the community's mothers, dreams of escaping with the man she loves. But when one of her daughters disappears, she must investigate and choose between her desire for freedom and her responsibilities. Winner of the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize at Cannes, nominated for the Queer Palm.

Director : Abinash Bikram Shah

Cast : Pushpa Thing Lama, Deepika Yadav, Jasmin Bishwokarma

Release : September 23, 2026, in theaters

Quelques jours à Nagi (Nagi Notes)

In competition at Cannes, Koji Fukada's new film follows Yuri, a divorced architect, who reconnects with her former sister-in-law Noriko, a sculptor living in Nagi. Noriko asks her to pose for her, and an ambiguous attraction builds between the two women. In parallel, two teenagers, Keita and Haruki, discover they are in love with each other.

Director : Koji Fukada

Cast : Takako Matsu, Shizuka Ishibashi, Kenichi Matsuyama

Release : October 7, 2026, in theaters

Marie Madeleine

In Jacmel, Haiti, the sea, the churches and the spirits shape life. Marie Madeleine is a free woman who lives off sex work and refuses to submit to the rules of those who claim to save souls. Her path crosses that of Joseph, a young evangelist whose faith wavers in her presence. Together, desire and the pursuit of freedom open up a space where everything can be reinvented. Presented at Cannes Première, nominated for the Queer Palm.

Director : Gessica Généus

Cast : Gessica Généus, Béonard Monteau, Edouard Baptiste

Release : October 2026, in theaters (exact date to be confirmed)

La Gradiva

A group of French high school students takes a school trip to Naples to discover the ruins of Pompeii and the bodies petrified by Vesuvius. Vertigo seizes them abruptly, and one by one, they let themselves be overwhelmed by desire and anger until they lose themselves completely. Grand Prize winner at Cannes Critics' Week, nominated for the Caméra d'or and the Queer Palm.

Director : Marine Atlan

Cast : Antonia Buresi, Julie Sokolowski, Colas Quignard, Suzanne Gerin

Release : November 4, 2026, in theaters

Coward

After Girl and Close, Lukas Dhont returns with a war drama presented in competition at Cannes. Pierre, a young Belgian soldier, wants to prove himself at the front during the First World War. Behind the lines, he meets Francis, who is tasked with boosting troop morale, and an attraction grows between the two men, through fleeting gestures and glances, in a setting where masculinity leaves no room for fragility.

Director : Lukas Dhont

Cast : Emmanuel Macchia, Valentin Campagne

Release : November 18, 2026, in theaters

Six mois dans la maison rose et bleue (Six Months in a Pink and Blue Building)

Mexico City, early 1990s. Bruno grows up in a happy, carefree family. On his eleventh birthday, he learns that his father is ill, but everyone keeps singing and dancing to ward off fate, like in a salsa song. Thirty years later, Bruno films to remember those six months in the pink and blue building of his childhood, and the discovery of an attraction to his best friend. Presented at Cannes Critics' Week.

Director : Bruno Santamaría Razo

Cast : Jade Reyes, Sofía Espinosa, Lázaro Gabino Rodríguez

Release : November 18, 2026, in theaters

Forty Love

The first feature film from fashion photographer Pierre-Ange Carlotti. Sacha Gallo, 21, only knows how to do one thing : play tennis. Trained by his father since childhood, together they dream of winning his first major title in Paris. The arrival of a new rival shakes his certainties and brings another challenge, love, an opponent as powerful as he is formidable.

Director : Pierre-Ange Carlotti

Cast : Paul Kircher, Romeo Beckham, Guillaume Canet, Benjamin Voisin, Catherine Deneuve

Release : November 25, 2026, in theaters

Du fioul dans les artères (Flesh and Fuel)

Étienne is a truck driver, tied to the road every week at the expense of his emotional life, settling for brief encounters with strangers at truck stops. When he meets Bartosz, a Polish truck driver, his heart is turned upside down. Despite their incompatible routes, Étienne is willing to do whatever it takes to give this story time to exist. Presented at Cannes Critics' Week.

Director : Pierre Le Gall

Cast : Alexis Manenti, Julian Świeżewski, Armindo Alves

Release : December 2, 2026, in theaters

La Bola Negra (The Black Ball)

Los Javis (Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi) won the Best Director award at Cannes for this epic, freely inspired by the work of Federico García Lorca. The story follows queer characters bound together by art, trauma and family legacy, across three eras : 1932, 1937 and 2017. A flamboyant, melodramatic film that pays tribute to queer artists who were victims of violence, while inviting new generations to carry their memory forward.

Directors : Javier Calvo, Javier Ambrossi

Cast : Guitarricadelafuente, Miguel Bernardeau, Penélope Cruz, Glenn Close, Lola Dueñas

Release : December 16, 2026, in French theaters (available on Netflix from December 4 in select territories)

Roma Elastica

In 1982, Eddie, a burnt-out French movie star, travels to Rome to shoot what may be her last film, supported by her loyal makeup artist Valentina. Bertrand Mandico delivers a flamboyant tribute to 1980s Italian cinema, somewhere between giallo and science fiction. Presented as a Midnight Screening at Cannes, in the running for the Queer Palm.

Director : Bertrand Mandico

Cast : Marion Cotillard, Noémie Merlant

Release : December 23, 2026, in theaters

Cœur secret (A Secret Heart)

Over the course of four years, Lilou has come out of hiding. She has become a 64 year old woman who loves fixing things, gardening, cycling and looking after her grandchildren. In documenting her transformation, the director filmed his own family healing its wounds and reinventing a place for everyone. Lilou is his father. A documentary presented at ACID, nominated for the Queer Palm and the Œil d'or.

Director : Tom Fontenille

Release : December 30, 2026, in theaters

For all LGBTQ+ events and nightlife in Paris and greater Paris, head to queer-paris.com.