“Jim Queen” is a film that very much sells itself (or very much does not, depending on the potential viewer) on its one-line elevator pitch. A cartoon about two gay men — one a vapid, brawny influencer, the other a shy, closeted slip of a thing — drawn together to fight Heterosis, a conversion virus launched by the conservative right on an unsuspecting queer community: You’re either in or you’re out, so to speak, and if you think that very premise sounds too silly to function, then nothing in French duo Marco Nguyen and Nicolas Athané’s dizzy, pastel-drenched satire is going to convince you otherwise. If the idea raises a chuckle, however, then so will much else in “Jim Queen”: a short, concentrated barrage of jokes good, bad and both, fired with enough energy and gee to keep a spirit of hilarity afloat throughout.
A rare shot of broad, brash comedy in the Cannes Film Festival — where it premiered in the Midnight section, providing something of a tonal counterpoint to the usual genre fare there — “Jim Queen” is in some ways a very French affair, shot through with specific satirical nods to local culture and politics (including a frosted-fascist villainess that some may liken to Marine Le Pen, though she’s more directly modelled on Sarkozy-era gay-rights opponent Christine Boutin). But it also translates readily to just about any market where there’s a vocal political movement against queer rights, which is to say more of the world than should be the case.
