Culture

Now Playing: ‘Leviticus’ could become a Queer Horror classic

By: Gordon Briggs
Posted on: Tuesday, June 23, 2026

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For decades, queer intimacy was regulated to subtext, or worse, was depicted as something to be feared or destroyed. Thankfully, this new Australian film has crafted a story with complex queer content that also completely works as a horror movie.

How can I describe Leviticus?

Think of the movie It Follows crossed with Boy Erased, and you get this brutal and bloody supernatural horror film with a tender gay love story at its center.

Here we meet Naim and Ryan, two teenage boys living in a conservative religious community. After a series of mysterious deaths begin to occur, they try to escape from a violent entity that takes the form of the person you desire most.

First things first, I liked Niam and Ryan. Not only does this movie make the religious community feel like a real place, but I also appreciate how the movie spends most of its first act establishing their awkward romance of coming out to each other and sharing a first kiss before any blood is drawn.

Plus, the movie is scary on multiple levels. The first is on a tactile level of body horror. The supernatural entity doesn’t just mentally torture its prey; it brutally assaults them, leading to plenty of ripped flesh and broken body parts that stand in stark contrast to the physical intimacy between Niam and Ryan.

Body horror is unnerving enough, but the central premise of Leviticus subverts intimacy. The very person the boys yearn for becomes their greatest threat. Every tender moment, touch, or kiss risks triggering a terrifying supernatural attack by a force impersonating their crush. This pervasive tone of paranoia leads to several effective sequences in which our two characters are unsure whether they are talking to the man they love or to a monster face-to-face.

In the context of Queer Horror, what’s disturbing is how the monster isn’t nearly as scary as the religious authority figures that desperately try to “cure” our couple with a form of conversion therapy.

That’s what appealed to me about this film. Our protagonists are being attacked on all sides. Not only must they survive a bloodthirsty monster and fight their communities’ homophobia, but they also must overcome their own fears of true intimacy with one another. ★ ★ ★1/2