Lilies

Released 1996
Stars Ian D. Clark, Marcel Sabourin, Aubert Pallascio, Jason Cadieux, Danny Gilmore, Matthew Ferguson, Brent Carver
Directed by John Greyson

Lilies is an emotionally intense, suspense-laden tale of love, betrayal and revenge between men. In 1952, a Catholic bishop makes an exceptional visit to a prison to hear a dying inmate's confession. Once inside the chapel, the bishop is taken hostage by Simon, a childhood friend. With the aid of his fellow inmates, Simon's version of the events that took place forty years earlier are reenacted. The action moves seamlessly through time between the crude prison and the actual events of 1912. The drama culminates on the tragic night when both men's fates were decided.

One of the most successful gay art-house films of 1997; winner of four of Canada's Genie Awards, including Best Picture and an official selection of Sundance Film Festival.

Summary by www.netflix.com

This is a brilliant film. It immediately sucks you in and tells its story in a way you have never seen before. In fact, it's so fresh it took me a while to figure out what was happening, because I didn't think a film would be this clever. It effortlessly interweaves its fantasy elements with the quasi-reality of the play, and the camerawork is simply gorgeous. My favorite images were the ones that involved water in the prison. The reflections from the water on the walls and the lighting created a beautiful, shimmering backdrop, and my very favorite scene was when the water on the prison floor dissolved into a beach shoreline. Simply gorgeous.

If you're homophobic (like me), you'll want to close your eyes during a couple of the kissing scenes, and the casting may make you squirm a little. The entire cast is men, and some of them are flaming. That was a choice by John Greyson that's a little creepy at times, but it works. --Bill Alward, February 1, 2002