15 Essential Movies For LGBT* Pride Month

Wong Kar-wai's heady, delirious 1997 film Happy Together explores the tempestuous love affair between two gay men seeking exile in Buenos Aires, its Chinese title using the same name for Michelangelo Antonioni's Blow Up, translating into "the exposure of something intimate".

Starring Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Leslie Cheung, the film depicts a cycle of abuse and reconciliation which eventually leads to the breakdown of the relationship as they try and fail to keep the passion between them lit. Shot by Wong Kar-wai's regular cinematographer Christopher Doyle, Happy Together is replete with sensual imagery, with bold use of high saturation mixed with black and white and glorious time-lapse shots of the bustling activity of the city.

The fate of star Leslie Cheung adds an additional layer of melancholy to Kar-wai's tale of doomed lovers. A gay man in real life, Cheung became a household name in Hong Kong who worked with many of the great directors of the era. Suffering from intense depression, he committed suicide in 2003 by jumping off the 24th floor of the Mandarin Hotel.