Lesbian Space Princess      Director: Emma Hough Hobbs, Leela Varghese Cert: 16Genre: AnimationStarring: Featuring Shabana Azeez, Bernie Van Tiel, Gemma Chua-Tran, Richard Roxburgh, Mark Samual Bonanno, Broden Kelly, Zachary Ruane Running Time: 1 hr 27 minsSince The Rocky Horror Picture Show, queer cinema has excelled at producing crowd-pleasing midnight-movie oddities: exuberant, defiantly niche works that transform limited resources into virtues. Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Varghese’s animated musical comedy Lesbian Space Princess belongs squarely in this royal lineage. Made on what the film-makers describe as a near-impossible budget, it is a small miracle of invention: scrappy, funny and incorporating comic-book squares, their feature looks as accomplished as its $200 million box-office rival Toy Story 5.The double entendres come thick and fast. In a proudly queer, faraway “gaylaxy”, Saira, the shy daughter of the lesbian monarchs of Clitopolis, a planet repeatedly described as hard to find – fnarr fnarr etc – is nursing a broken heart after being dumped by her glamorous bounty-hunter girlfriend, Kiki. The pining teen is thrust into unlikely action when Kiki is abducted by the Straight White Maliens, a race of aggrieved interstellar incels demanding a legendary royal weapon as ransom.The plot follows a familiar coming-of-age trajectory. Saira’s quest across the cosmos becomes a journey towards self-confidence – or at least less bawling – aided by an assortment of eccentric companions. A malfunctioning spacecraft AI voiced by Richard Roxburgh makes for the most sarcastic on-board computer system since Red Dwarf; Gemma Chua-Tran’s folk-goth nonbinary songstress provides a love interest for the oblivious, Kiki-obsessed Saira.[ Linus O’Brien on The Rocky Horror Film Show: ‘Rocky has tangibly saved lives. It created a real sense of community’Opens in new window ]Pitched somewhere between Sailor Moon and Rick and Morty, the film makes merry with world-building. Hobbs and Varghese pack every frame with visual jokes, LGBTQ references and pop-cultural detours. Rather than framing queerness as struggle, Lesbian Space Princess imagines a universe where it is simply the chaotic and colourful norm.The animation, nodding to anime, web cartoons and DIY punk aesthetics, has a rough-hewn, heartfelt charm. Not every joke lands, but the generous, camp sensibility buoys the material. Even the bumbling Straight White Maliens find a happily-ever-after of sorts. In cinemas from Friday, June 19th