Yippee-ky-yay everybody, there’s a new entry into the catalog of gay Western flicks from first-time feature director Luke Guilford! The man behind the music video for Troye Sivan’s cum gutter and ass crack-baring Angel Baby has helmed National Anthem, a drama about a young construction worker who joins a queer rodeo in New Mexico set to hit theaters tomorrow.

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Charlie Plummer, who previously appeared shirtless in 2019’s Looking for Alaska and 2023’s Wildflower, plays the troubled 21-year-old who finds a new sense of self and community on the ranch. He joins a growing list of queer cowboys in cinema who could leave their hats on any day, if you catch our drift.

Giddyup for the Queer Cowboys of Cinema

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Even in their earlier days, Westerns have always had some homoerotic undertones, most notably when closeted Hollywood star Montgomery Clift played Matt Garth in 1948’s Red River, who develops a very queer-coded bond with John Ireland’s Cherry Valance. But as of late, the queer cowboy has become a cinema staple, so much so it was even fodder in the gay rom-com Bros in 2022.

Pedro Almodovar, an indisputable icon of LGBTQ+ filmmaking, tried his hand at a gay Western when he created last year’s Strange Way of Life, which had not one but TWO hot homosexual couples: daddies Ethan Hawke and Pedro Pascal plus Jason Fernández and José Condessa. Though just a short, it gave us our first look at Pedro Pascal nude in over five years when he bared his ass in bed.

Giddyup for the Queer Cowboys of CinemaGiddyup for the Queer Cowboys of CinemaGiddyup for the Queer Cowboys of Cinema

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Speaking of daddies, there’s the daddy of all gay Westerns, Ang Lee’s seminal drama Brokeback Mountain. The late Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal must be sky-high prairie fences because we simply cannot get over them in this film! Even almost a quarter of a century later, we still swoon over their skinny-dipping, wrasslin’, and cowboy canoodling.

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It wasn’t until 2021 that we got another gay Western Best Picture nominee in Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog, but it was worth the wait since it gave us the best Benedict Cumberbatch nude scene so far when the beguiling Brit went full frontal while covering himself in mud.

Giddyup for the Queer Cowboys of Cinema

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There are even some who would place the 1970 comedy There Was a Crooked Man… among other gay Westerns, both for its many shots of men all sweaty and stripped down together in the hot sun but also because two of the characters (portrayed by Hume Cronyn and John Randolph) play like a surreptitious couple.

Giddyup for the Queer Cowboys of Cinema

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Then there’s the 2023 Australian indie Lonesome starring Josh Lavery, who’s as smooth and strong as a shot of whiskey in his eight amazing nude scenes. The film is so full of gay sex it’ll have you unloading your own six-shooter!

Giddyup for the Queer Cowboys of Cinema

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