7 gay sex scenes that changed cinema, ranked

Murray Bartlett rimming Lukas Gage. Tom Hollander fucking “naughty nephew” Leo Woodall. Patrick Schwarzenegger giving on-screen brother Sam Nivola a hand job.

God bless The White Lotus, and its constellation of compellingly chaotic gay sex scenes, which are all, for one reason or another, hard to stomach. (The second and third for obvious reasons… The first we previously thought hot, but on balance, once you see a relapsed addict abusing professional authority, you can’t unsee it.)

That all those sex scenes are devoid of romance – the same for many that generate viral conversation – is also worth noting. To be clear: we’re not judging sex without emotion. It is valid, if all parties consent, and can be hot as hell. (Although, often, it’s not.) It’s just that lately, we’re hungering for something more… both in our sex lives, and in the content we consume. Call it the Heated Rivalry effect.

Jumping from the small to silver screen, here, we revisit the most powerful gay sex scenes on celluloid. Lights, camera, passion!

7. Tom Cullen and Chris New in Weekend (2011)

That Paul-Mescal-licking-cum-from-Andrew Scott’s-pecs scene in All of Us Strangers is potentially a motif for director Andrew Haigh. Semen was first seen matter-of-factly splattered across the chest of one of a pair of forlorn male lovers in this, his debut feature, 12 years earlier.

We gay-gasped when we saw it: a queer man’s load. A sight still so vanishingly rare in an Odeon cinema, we never forgot it. (Nor the conflicted look in Chris New’s eyes at the train station by the film’s end.) His and Tom Cullen’s swooning chemistry proves it: casual, chance encounters can lead to more, if you let them.

6. Josh O’Connor and Alec Secăreanu in God’s Own Country (2017)

Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights whomst?! Now we think about it, Francis Lee’s Yorkshire-set drama has Emily Brontë’s trademark brutality in spades: the thunderous weather, the gigantic emotions, the brooding protagonists. To wit: when Romanian immigrant Gheorghe saves a lamb by incubating it in his coat, our knees quivered. He hints at showing such tenderness to colleague Johnny… if only the angry farmhand could open up.

The rough, muddy sex that ensues is actually hard to watch, shot in the same gritty, naturalistic style as when the director trains his lens on animals being born and dying. But, like flowers pushing through harsh, frozen soil, the vulnerability beneath the aggression – and the love – shines through.

5. Jacob Elordi and Diego Calva in On Swift Horses

Sweet, tender and intense, the man-on-man lovemaking in Daniel Minahan’s period drama unfolds in 1950s Nevada, against a backdrop of buttoned-up, post-war illegality. The star power of Euphoria’s Jacob Elordi helped raise the profile of this underrated (and underseen) indie, whose story reminds us that gay sex and love always find a way, even in the most punishing of circumstances.

“I don’t want a classic story of tragedy around these queer characters and then they have kinky sex — no, no, no,” said Jacob’s co-star Diego Calva in a 2025 interview with Attitude, quoting director Minahan. “He’s such a gentleman. He told us: ‘I don’t want to provoke the audience. This is about actual love.’ … They’re two sweet guys who really fall in love. Henry is wilder and more dangerous in the streets. But with Julius, he’s very tender.”

4. Kim Min-hee and Kim Tae-ri in The Handmaiden

The first issue of Attitude Uncut was pegged (pardon the pun) on kink, inspired by Alexander Skarsgård’s ‘dom com’ Pillion, and saw us describe in indulgent detail the woodland orgy scene (leather! Thigh-sized dildos!) that, ironically, precedes the first flickers of real emotional connection between the two leads. But we ultimately ranked Park Chan-wook’s 2016 South Korean thriller The Handmaiden – all elaborate sex toys and 1930s erotica – as kinkier.

But beneath the eye-popping porniness and twisty-turny narrative are some cheeringly sweet lesbian sex scenes that luxuriate in cliché, from satin sheets to orgasmic scissoring. This film, inspired by Sarah Waters’s Victorian-era novel Fingersmith, is one of the all-time greats.

3. Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain

In this Attitude article examining Brokeback’s enduring legacy at 20, we reflected on the time a curious straight guy asked us of Jack and Ennis “how did they decide… who fucked who?” thus revealing the film for the ‘cultural permission slip’ that it was.

In that scene, Jack and Ennis fuck aggressively without lube in a tent. (If you’ve been there, you’ll know there’s nothing romantic about stale air – or, being fucked stale.) That’s later balanced by a “more intimate, less brutal” love scene, as per the late Heath Ledger in his 2006 cover interview with Attitude. (“Absolutely a conscious decision.”) Beautiful though it is, it’s the raw honesty of that first scene that sticks in the memory.

2. Naomi Watts and Laura Harring in Mulholland Drive

No, not the scene of Naomi Watts’s heartbroken Diane furiously masturbating and crying – that’s another list entirely. Rather, the likely imagined (and therefore idealised) encounter between Diane’s other self, Betty, and vulnerable amnesiac Rita. The pair, both lost in LA, forge a friendship that’s childlike in its innocence, giving way to the sort of perfectly romantic sex that you just know is too good to be true.

“I’m in love with you,” gasps Diane with soul-bearing openness, as she touches Camilla’s breasts. Never has this film-lover believed a line of dialogue more. The scene ought to have been cloying, but in the late, great David Lynch’s hands – a straight man’s, no less – it lands with astonishing effect, and palpable, exquisite queerness.

And yet, it’s perhaps total fantasy on Diane’s part. Rita’s real-world counterpart, Camilla, is depicted as cold, superior, and emotionally abusive towards her ex-lover– and so sexually attractive, it’s intimidating. One hopes Diane’s fantasy is at least in part based on kinder encounters from their past; that there’s at least some truth to the seemingly reciprocal love that bleeds through the screen in that previous scene – and that real, human connection precedes the tragedy that unfolds.

1. Ashton Sanders and Jharrel Jerome in Moonlight

In 2000, the slapstick teen sex of American Pie seemed daring. These days, it’s all headlines like Bonnie Blue: I Went Viral for Banging Over a Hundred 18 Year Olds for OnlyFans. Given the ubiquitous pornification of sex in our culture, films like Moonlight offer a vital counterpoint, demonstrating how sex, and burgeoning teen sexuality in particular, can be beautiful and loving. This writer cannot even think about the scene in question without starting to cry.

In it, two teenage boys connect physically on a beach in early-2000s Miami, despite the oppressive cultural forces that pull them apart for the next decade, with the actors’ trembling trepidation making this the sweetest, gentlest scene on this list.

Despite the despair surrounding both characters, the viewer’s heart burns with gratitude that these fictional young people have at least have one golden first experience under their belts, and one that eludes so many. Also, it’s good to see a simple hand job depicted as seismic and life-changing – so warped are we by close-ups of hardcore penetration in porn. Shout out to the sides out there!

This article first appeared in The Film Issue of Attitude Uncut.