Top 5 Lesbian Films And Series Released In 2025

It’s genuinely exciting to live in 2025, a moment where we’re finally getting more lesbian media than ever before. Being queer today still comes with its challenges, and yes, meaningful representation in film is far from perfect, but I can’t imagine going back to an era when all we really had were The L Word and But I’m a Cheerleader, or when our greatest cinematic hope was that Jess and Jules might actually kiss in Bend It Like Beckham. 

One of the real joys of this new wave is the depth of the characters—queerness is no longer the entirety of our personality on screen, nor is it automatically the source of all conflict. We get to be complicated, we get to be soft, and we get to be just as messy as anyone else.

Every year, right around Madrid’s queer film festival, CineQueerMad, I have a little burst of cinephilia. And lucky for you all, I’ve done the digging, sifted through the chaos, and narrowed it down to my top five lesbian films and series released in 2025.

The Wedding Banquet

This 2025 remake reimagines Ang Lee’s original 1993 classic and updates the premise for a new generation, now centering a lesbian couple in Seattle (yes, complete with a Subaru and Pacific Northwest knitwear). The couple, Lee (Lily Gladstone) and Angela (Kelly Marie Tran), have already gone through IVF twice without success. They desperately want to try again, but the cost is simply out of reach.

Enter: Min (Han Gi-chan), the sweet but slightly hapless boyfriend of Angela’s best friend Chris (Bowen Yang), who also happens to live in the backyard apartment of Angela and Lee’s property. Min’s visa is about to expire, which means he’ll have to return to Korea to his conservative grandparents and to take over the family business—something he absolutely does not want.

Angela and Min strike an agreement: they’ll enter a marriage of convenience so he can secure a green card, and in exchange, Min will help cover the next round of IVF for Angela and Lee. What follows is a delightfully chaotic cascade of family visits, bureaucratic panic, rapidly escalating lies, and a steadily growing web of emotional entanglement that shouldn’t work…but absolutely does in rom-com logic.

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We often joke in queer circles about the logistics of queer family-building: the donor dilemmas, IVF exhaustion, “what if we got pregnant at the same time” debates, and the truly unhinged hypotheticals that come out during late-night conversations with queer friends. But rarely, if ever, do these real, funny, deeply specific queer conversations make it into mainstream media. This film actually lets them be central and as messy as one would expect.

The Wedding Banquet is ridiculous in all the right ways: just implausible enough to satisfy the rom-com fantasy, grounded enough to feel heartfelt, and queer in a way that’s lived-in rather than tokenized. And, as rom-com tradition requires, everything ties up neatly in the end.

A genuinely fun, warm, easy watch streaming now on Hulu and Amazon Prime.

Hedda

Hedda is Amazon Prime’s latest attempt at a lesbian period piece, adapted from Henrik Ibsen’s 19th-century play Hedda Gabler. The premise is simple: a mopey, presumably straight woman, newly married and already exhausted by the limitations of her life, has a rather exciting sapphic side that unfolds. Watching it, I couldn’t help but think of Valerie Solanas and her description of life under patriarchy in the SCUM Manifesto:

Life in this society being, at best, an utter bore and no aspect of society being at all relevant to women, there remains to civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking females only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation and destroy the male sex.

Hedda, played by Tessa Thompson, may not be striving for full automation or the complete overthrow of the male sex, but critics have long called her “the female Hamlet.” That title was granted not because she’s avenging anything, but because she’s one of literature’s great internally-conflicted, restless, impossible-to-contain characters. She’s a thrill-seeking queer trapped in the gender expectations of the 1800s, pushing against a world that feels far too small.

All that said, the film is genuinely enjoyable. It’s moody, atmospheric, and performed well. And, importantly, it’s very easy to stream on Amazon Prime.

After the Hunt

I found After the Hunt, by Luca Guadagnino, absolutely compelling. It’s heavy at times, and uncomfortably relatable for anyone who’s spent time on college campuses, but it handles difficult themes around sexual violence and the complex dynamics of elite academic spaces with real care. The story follows Maggie, played by our absolute favorite Ayo Edebiri, who accuses a professor (Andrew Garfield) of sexual assault. Alma (Julia Roberts), Maggie’s philosophy professor, finds herself caught in the middle, torn between allegiances and misled by her own traumatic past. The film does an excellent job of making us feel the tension, understand Alma’s conflicting concerns, and simultaneously sympathize fully with Maggie.

While it’s not explicitly a lesbian film, Maggie is queer. Her sexuality is established through her relationship with Alex (Lío Mehiel), her non-binary partner, and at one point is cynically used against her as “woke college student posturing.” By the end, we learn she has a new girlfriend, a subtle nod that acknowledges her queerness without making it the film’s defining trait. It’s refreshing to see characters who are casually queer, where queerness is part of who they are rather than their defining trait.

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Overall, it’s a well-crafted, thought-provoking film that balances heaviness with empathy and tells a story that feels both urgent and nuanced.

Streamable on Amazon Prime.

Hal & Harper 

Hal & Harper is a really sweet series (complete with a fun soundtrack) that centers two siblings who share a very important, sometimes codependent, but ultimately special relationship. When their dad announces that he’s having a baby with his girlfriend, the siblings are pushed to reflect on their choices, their frustrations with their family, and some of the deeper pain they’ve carried since childhood. The eight-episode series is a thoughtful depiction of the role siblings play in each other’s lives and in their ongoing growth.

The lesbian storyline isn’t central to the conflict, but it is something Harper (Lili Reinhart) is navigating. Within the first ten minutes, we learn that she has cheated on her long-term girlfriend, Jesse (Alyah Chanelle), after making out with her co-worker, Audrey (Addison Timlin). The development of this new relationship brings other changes in her life, and her queer relationships become a meaningful part of her growth.

The series is heartfelt and sweet, especially if you have siblings and can relate to feeling both love and anger toward family at the same time. You can stream now on Mubi.

Taurasi: 

Taurasi is a mini docuseries about Diana Taurasi, one of the best women’s basketball players in the world and an openly queer icon. This three-episode series follows the American-Argentinian WNBA champion as she takes us behind the scenes of what it means to be a professional athlete, a mom, and a global sports brand. She’s bold, funny, and totally outspoken.

It’s fascinating to hear about her childhood—dominating the boys at the park, moving to Argentina and back, and eventually making her mark in Division I at UConn. What I found even more compelling, though, is how the docuseries talks about Taurasi as being “sub-commercialized” because she didn’t fit traditional, heteronormative expectations. One interview explains that, at the time, the WNBA was deeply concerned with commercial viability, attracting advertisers, and securing sponsors, so players were pushed toward a more “marketable,” hyper-feminine, straight image to make the league feel easier to promote. In doing so, they completely missed the opportunity to highlight Taurasi’s swag, confidence, and personality. Ironically, these are the very things that now make her one of the most iconic players in the sport.

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Even if you’re not a sports fan, the series is engrossing. It’s a rare, behind-the-scenes look at an incredibly talented person navigating pressure, expectations, and identity, something that resonates far beyond the court.

Streamable on Amazon Prime.

Honorable mentions:

Summer’s Camera

This film is an incredibly sweet, queer soccer story—a genre I’d happily take a lot more of. What I love most is that queerness isn’t treated as the central conflict; it’s simply one dimension of the characters’ lives, something they navigate with a lightness that feels refreshing. In many ways, it’s a film about hobbies.

Summer (Kim Si-Ah) discovers photography through her late father, holding on to his last unfinished roll of film, too sentimental to shoot it. That changes when she becomes completely captivated by Yeonwoo (Yu Ga-eun), the school’s star soccer player. When she finally develops the film, she uncovers her father’s queer past. This revelation leads her to his former lover, who unexpectedly becomes a mentor figure and a gentle guide into her queer universe.

I found the film wholesome. There’s no heavy-handed drama or high-stakes coming-out scene. Instead, queerness simply surrounds the characters, allowing space for subtle, surprising relationships to grow. It’s a well-crafted, heartfelt story about first love, loss, and the soft ways we find ourselves.

The film is mentioned by Mubi, but it’s not yet available to stream. Stay tuned. 

Honey Don’t

Honey Don’t is a wild, stylish, and satisfying ride. And yes, the main character, played by Margaret Qualley, is undeniably sexy. It’s also a delight to see Aubrey Plaza fully unleashed in a lesbian role, chewing up scenes with that signature mix of deadpan chaos and smoldering intensity. The film itself is action-packed, fully committed to the thrill of watching women take on crime, put men firmly in their place, and have unapologetically hot lesbian sex on screen.

It’s a Coen film, but with the unmistakable imprint of Ethan Coen’s wife (in an open, non-traditional marriage) and long-time collaborator,, Tricia Cooke, who co-wrote and edited the project. Cooke put it best: “It’s a queer movie. I add the gayness to it. Being a lesbian, I bring that to the writing process, a kind of understanding of that world.” Her influence shows. Together, Coen and Cooke deliver a story that’s not only wickedly entertaining but also aware of the cultural moment it drops into—a little rebellious, a little defiant, and completely uninterested in toning down its gayness for anyone.

Lucky for us, it’s available on Amazon Prime.