I love Denzel Washington, but his acting range has been curbed by prudish Hollywood directors for decades. Denzel recently revealed a gay kiss was removed from Gladiator II during an interview for LGBTQ news outlet Gaytey: “I actually kissed a man in the film but they took it out, they cut it, I think they got chicken. I kissed a guy full on the lips and I guess they weren’t ready for that yet. I killed him about five minutes later. It’s ‘Gladiator.’ It’s the kiss of death.”
The director of the film, Ridley Scott, denied Denzel’s claim in a Variety interview, “No, that’s bullshit. They never did. They acted the moment — it didn’t happen.” But it should have happened. Denzel should have been kissing dudes in movies all along. And I’m ranking his entire filmography based on how much better they would be if he had.
40. The Taking of Pelham 123 (2009)
Denzel Washington is one of the greatest actors of all time.
John Travolta is not—and this mediocre remake confirms it.
The movie isn’t bad because of Travolta but he certainly didn’t make it better. He’s just not a serious villain or even a properly unhinged one. The days of Swordfish, Broken Arrow, and Face/Off were far behind him. The vibes are funky. He’s cartoonish, especially in the ending where Denzel, the most committed MTA dispatcher of all time, chases him down after a subway-hostage-stock-heist. Denzel holds him at gunpoint awaiting the slowest moving police backup ever; caught and cornered, Travolta taunts him into shooting him in the heart then stalls for a few seconds before saying, “You’re my goddamn hero,” and dropping dead on the bridge.
But if you’re going to ham it up, then HAM IT UP:
Denzel shoots. Travolta sways in confusion and grasps weakly at his chest while sputtering for air as tears despair his bloodshot eyes. He lunges forward to pin Denzel against the chain link fence and sobs loudly into Denzel’s shoulder for three excruciating minutes before dropping spasmodically to the ground to reveal the crimson smear of his kiss on Denzel’s cheek. Then the cops arrive and shoot him 122 more times. The movie would be worse, way worse, but it’d enter the range of being so bad it’s worth rewatching.
39. He Got Game (1998)
No gay stuff. Just one fatherly kiss on the forehead and a ton of heartfelt hugs—because if Denzel had been more open, honest, and compassionate with his son then they would have reconciled much earlier and Jesus would have agreed to sign with Big State then Jake would have had his early release.
Heck, if he was nicer to his son from the start he wouldn’t have been in prison at all. Replace all that tension and character growth with unconditional love so it’s a fun family flick about a good basketball player… I’m describing an inferior movie. I see that.
38. Training Day (2001)
The chemistry between Denzel and Ethan Hawke is undeniable, that’s the real story here, but so much movie is wasted building some tyrant cop B plot which ends in an unsatisfying, unambiguous resolution for the unredeemed Detective Alonzo Harris.
We can do better. Hawke wants to fix Denzel because he knows their PCP-hazed gay kiss in the Monte Carlo really meant something to them both. And in the climactic ending, the boys let the whole neighborhood know that love wins: Hawke asks him, “You wanna go to jail or do you wanna go to my home?” a pregnant pause then a quick cut to the fellas making out on his couch. Denzel agrees to resign from the police department and Hawke helps him write an apology letter to the Russians. Yeah that’s worse, too.
37. Unstoppable (2010)
This is an action movie for train nerds. Will railfans even notice if there’s a gay kiss? The locomotive cinematography is so pornographic already: 90 minutes of uncomfortable closeups, engines bumpin’ uglies with cabooses, everything is exploding, and their big finish is pulling on the long red train until it gets tired and stops spraying sparks everywhere.
There’s no “hero kisses villain” in this one… the villain is a train. The real baddie is institutional incompetence. I guess there is a subplot between veteran Denzel and in-training conductor Chris Pine, but they’re both blue-collar family men—so I don’t think they’d even do platonic kissing after (spoiler) stopping the unstoppable train. I think the closest they’d get is becoming softcore eskimo brothers in the end when Rosario Dawson kisses them both on the cheek in quick succession. But again, this is a movie about trains getting freaky so it won’t change anything.
36. Fences (2016)
Fences is one of the greatest Broadway plays of all time. And the movie is one of the best Broadway adaptations of all time; but that is a much shorter list. It’s a tough entry here because it was explicitly reproduced with faithfulness to the source material in mind. So we’ll keep everything the same: Denzel reprises the role he played on stage as Troy Maxson: a stubborn, bitter, womanizing, yet hardworking, charming father who grapples with his personal failures as he tries to raise his son better than his father raised him.
It’s a powerful and often cold drama, the few times we see true uninhibited and unconditional warmth from Denzel are in his moments with his friend Jim Bono. He is Denzel’s foil, they were in prison together years ago and work together now, so have had many of the same experiences but Bono is selfless, humble, complimentary, and gentle. Staying faithful to the original script I wouldn’t dare add any gay moments… so I’m just saying: prison is lonely without a close friend and Bono is the first to recognize Denzel’s infidelity. Maybe he knows those moves from firsthand experiences because who wouldn’t want to smooch Bono.
35. Glory (1989)
Glory is already a perfect movie—a fictional recounting of the 54th Infantry Regiment, a black Union army unit led by a white colonel (Matthew Broderick) to capture a Confederate fort during the Civil War. Denzel plays a young, brash soldier embattled not just against the South but also against his fellow infantrymen. They’re all from different backgrounds with clashing personalities and ideologies but eventually they gain each other’s respect, trust, and brotherly love.
I cry at the ending every time: killed during the siege, the corpse of Matthew Broderick is dropped callously into a mass grave to be joined seconds later by Denzel’s body which slides slowly into the nook of his colonel’s shoulder. It’s a beautiful moment but I think we can push it a few more inches until Denzel and Broderick are nuzzling cheek to cheek in an eternal embrace of equality. It’s not a full kiss—I would never do something so disrespectful to a biopic this early in the list.
34. Much Ado About Nothing (1993)
Let’s be really real, this Shakespeare script is about a messy bisexual polycule already—the fellas just never got the chance to act in the moment. They were forced into conventional marriages instead.
Major rewrites to flex 400 years of libido liberation: we get Keanu with Denzel, Denzel with Kenneth Branagh, Kate Beckinsale with Claudio and Keanu, Denzel and constable Michael Keaton and Keanu and Borachio. It’s endless really. Keep the exposition at the start but then cram it full of so much Elizabethan wooing then canoodling that everyone forgets about the weddings. The movie only had room to review marginally better anyway, but lots of kissing would have distracted everyone from the accents long enough to land a few Oscar nominations.
33. Courage Under Fire (1996)
This is a phenomenal movie and there’s not much room for improvement, not gonna spoil anything—go watch it. It’s one of Denzel’s best performances but really the whole cast is incredible and everyone acts their ass off; even the supporting characters. None more so than Matt Damon who basically starved himself to lose 40 pounds during the filming all for a years-later scene.
In a post-Good Will Hunting interview Matt said he was so depressed by his overlooked commitment to Courage Under Fire that he had contemplated suicide. So this entry isn’t about improving the plot so much as it is giving Matt Damon his flowers. Give him a few more days on set to shine: he’s a broken young man, let Denzel fix him with warmth, comprehension, love, and affectionate kisses.
32. Chasing Trane (2016)
It’s so tricky to gay up a documentary where Denzel is just offscreen reading excerpts of John Coltrane’s biography. But, taking some creative license, what if he narrated a teenage memory where John fell hopelessly in love with a fella named Saxophone. It would recontextualize every photo of him playing his instrument as an intense, intimate kiss. Every jazzy number played in the background is an echo of his deep unrequited love for Sax.
You’d never think of him the same way and—really—that’s what documentaries are all about. So it’s a better movie.
31. Cry Freedom (1987)
In one of his earliest roles, and certainly the first standout, Denzel plays the historical figure Steve Biko, an activist fighting against South African apartheid, who develops a friendship with a white journalist—Donald Woods, played by Kevin Kline. Denzel is arrested, beaten by racist police officers, and dies in their custody.
Although accuracy is important in telling these stories, I think some audience members could use a little more emotional connection to tie Woods’ unflinching resolve in uncovering the truth of Denzel’s death. Just one quick smooch to seal their friendship and we’d understand the depth of connection between these two brave figures.
30. Philadelphia (1993)
Inspired by true events… great.
Denzel has to get justice for Tom Hank’s character, an attorney unjustly fired from his law firm because they suspected he had AIDS. Denzel overcomes his personal prejudices against homosexuality, having spent the movie grappling with his legal representation of Hanks while holding many of the same misgivings regarding transmissibility that resulted in his firing.
You’d think there’s a lot of gay kissing opportunities to add here but since it’s biographical the changes need to be tasteful. I can still make this work though! There’s a good opportunity in the powerful, unforgettable ending scene where Denzel visits Hanks in the hospital where he finally touches his friend’s face to reapply Hanks’ oxygen mask. It’s the ultimate sign of respect, compassion, and personal growth that could have been all the more powerful with a kiss goodbye.
29. Antwone Fisher (2002)
Another very serious biographic drama, but this one tees up a kiss too. Denzel is a Navy therapist helping Antwone, a young sailor with a very troubled past: orphaned, abused by his foster mother, molested by another woman at the foster home, and homeless for years.
Halfway into the movie, Antwone gets arrested for beating up a guy for basically calling him gay because he’s a virgin. Speaking to him at the jail, Denzel finally gets Antwone to reveal that his childhood is why he grapples with intimacy with the lady sailor who Denzel has been encouraging him to date.
In our rewrite, Denzel realizes that Antwone has been buried under toxic social expectations for his whole life—including during therapy—so devises a plan to liberate Antwone from his prison: Antwone will be a captive audience to Denzel’s no-homo kiss with another high-ranking, straight Navy officer. It’s just two dudes kissing each other in front of a jail cell, but that moment destroys all notions of cold oppressive authority and hateful sexual repression.
28. The Great Debaters (2007)
I definitely forgot how many historical movies there would be on this list…
Yes this is one of the best academic dramas ever, but we’ll find an improvement. Set during the segregated 1930s—Denzel pushes, pulls, and provokes a small class of brilliant young students from a black college to become the best debate team in the country; eventually challenging Harvard in a broadcast across the country. Each speech is incredible, intense, and incisive. But my favorite debate isn’t on a stage between two students, it’s in a home library between a father and a teacher.
Forest Whitaker is concerned that his son is being exposed to extreme ideas and dangerous situations by Denzel, who sharply defends his methods. It only lasts a few minutes but the chemistry is impeccable as the men rapidly shift gears from congratulations to politics to religion to paternalism then settle back into niceties as their wives enter the room. It’s a perfect moment for a gay kiss. Whitaker—equal parts charmed and combative—leans in to press Denzel on his claim that Jesus was a radical, saying “He loved his neighbor, that’s not radical” to which Denzel responds by kissing him on the lips and replying “Was that radical?” to communicate how he feels betrayed that Whitaker would think him so disingenuous or careless in his instruction.
27. The Hurricane (1999)
You’ve gotta be kidding me with these biopics, Denzel.
Fine. He’s a rising star boxer in the 1960s who gets locked up—twice—for murder he didn’t commit. Racism is shitty like that. Luckily a teenager named Lesra Martin reads Denzel’s autobiography and his family works to get the conviction overturned.
It’s a great drama, but it is heavily fictionalized. And as long as we’re taking creative liberties, I think I can gay this this up without offending anyone involved. Age Lesra into his late twenties so it’s less weird when we have him develop a romantic relationship with Denzel who delivers the iconic line “Hate put me into prison, loves gonna bust me out” before they kiss through the prison bars.
26. Malcolm X (1992)
This list was a bad idea.
25. The Little Things (2021)
Oh good, we’re done with his true stories; this one is just about cops covering for each other after they kill innocent people.
During the big interrogation scene, we get rancid Jared Leto mocking a kiss at Denzel that is so graphic that the whole audience feels violated—especially dudes. He never makes physical contact, he’s just tongue wagging the air to taunt the cops, but it’s so gross it fully justifies everything else that happens in the movie so nobody’s left haunted by their mistakes.
Wouldn’t make up for the bad pacing or glaring plot holes, but it would be a better movie!
24. Flight (2012)
Flight is not so much a movie about flying as it is about falling. It’s about the turbulent experiences of an alcoholic guy surrounded by self-interested enablers. That alcoholic just happens to be a veteran pilot who miraculously lands a plane while inebriated. The crash scene is a cinematic masterpiece and Denzel gives this one everything—it’s some of the best acting he’s ever done.
So why is the rating so low? Well, I think everyone wanted more out of the ending.
Not the court hearing scene; that was perfect too. So perfect that Denzel deserves a reward for passionately admitting his problem and bravely accepting the consequences. Instead of jumping a year ahead straight to Denzel’s closing monologue at the prison’s support group, first we get a scene of the lockup process and then a montage of the 96 crash survivors visiting Denzel in prison over the course of that year. Some are angry but most are grateful; there’s a lot of hugs and even some gay kisses. It would make his support group speech way more emotionally charged because we’ve glimpsed his journey since the trial.
23. The Mighty Quinn (1989)
I have no idea why the audience score is so low on this… but the critics got it right: this is one of the most fun movies in Denzel’s catalog. He’s a young, charming, sexy, police chief of a Caribbean island on a quest to uncover the truth behind murder accusations against his friend-since-childhood Robert Townsend.
You can’t convince me that the chronically unbuttoned Denzel—who sings a song he hates just to bring together the community—wouldn’t at some point engage in a casual bicurious fling with his buddy. It was just dudes being dudes, acting in the moment, and we should have seen it. Wouldn’t have moved the needle much for critics but maybe it would have convinced everyone else that this is an uninhibited cop romp.
22. Virtuosity (1995)
Denzel is a former cop who has been recruited to stop a rogue android, Russell Crowe, self-described as a “50 terrabyte self-evolving neural network” who was trained on data on the most Sadistic Intelligent Dangerous serial killers in history. The stakes are high, Denzel was in prison for having shot a terrorist who killed his family; and the data of that terrorist was wrapped up into the SID project! Why does SID exist? I can’t remember, but Crowe certainly had fun playing him—killing dozens, taking hostages, and mentally torturing our hero.
The low scores make way more sense on this one. This is not a good movie.
One reason The Matrix hit so hard was because it was coming off two decades of cheesy science-fantasy cyberslop. But Virtuosity is so silly it’s enjoyable as a corny popcorn flick and it’s yearning for a smooch. Act in the moment: Crowe is insane, unpredictable, and violative. He would absolutely force a taunting kiss onto Denzel when he least expects it. Maybe even slip in some tongue. It wouldn’t save the movie, but nobody would be surprised that it happened.
21. American Gangster (2007)
You might think I’m the sort of perv who would make Denzel and Russell Crowe kiss again after their Virtuosity smooch just as a poetic rekindling of the flame now that their roles are reversed with Crowe as the hero cop and Denzel as the murderous psycho…
Nope. That doesn’t work here. American Gangster is a movie about power. Machismo. Domination. Denzel is cold, clever, ruthless, and ambitious; but he’s still not at the top of the food chain. Josh Brolin is the dirtiest of dirty cops so when he pulls over Denzel to steal keys of heroin from his trunk he does it just to re-establish control. It was a check in the chess game of their feud; a riposte for Denzel blowing up Brolin’s 1966 Shelby GT350H. Brolin stares him down—boasting the boldness of his response—then Denzel plants a kiss right on the tip of his nose. Denzel’s iconic smirk ignites embers in Brolin’s eyes as he realizes he’s already lost the control he so recently grasped.
(I mean, sure, if Denzel and Russell wanna have a little friendly reunion kiss when they’re hanging out in the end—laughing as they pin dirty cops to the wall—yeah, I wouldn’t complain. That’d be really cute and would show the narrative range of dudes kissing.)
20. 2 Guns (2013)
Denzel and Mark Wahlberg are partners in crime but they’re both unaware that the other guy is an undercover cop from a different agency and they’re both trying to bring down a Mexican cartel. That’s a great meet cute.
When the guys discover a drug lord’s stash of $40 million, their buddy cop chemistry flash boils into a steamy romantic moment. Denzel forgets all about his smokin’ hot DEA girlfriend as the guys reforge their relationship with honesty and admiration after some pillow talk reveals who they each really work for. They could have broken the action movie mold with that kiss, instead it was another formulaic summer blockbuster.
19. Ricochet (1991)
John Lithgow is great at playing villains. People who think his Dexter arc was out-of-character don’t realize 3rd Rock from the Sun was the real outlier against Obsession, Cliffhanger, Raising Cain, Blow Out, and this sleeper. In Ricochet, Lithgow is a ruthless criminal psychopath who gets arrested by Denzel who then goes on to become a highly-regarded Assistant District Attorney. Meanwhile, Lithgow joins up with the Aryan Brotherhood to plan his prison break and get revenge on Denzel—killing a lot of people in the process.
There’s a crazy scene where Lithgow and Denzel are arm wrestling in an empty pool to settle their feud, but it’s actually a ploy to pin Denzel down and inject him with heroin. Then Lithgow pays a prostitute to rape Denzel in his drug haze, which they record to destroy his marriage and professional reputation. But it would be even more psycho if Lithgow did the deed himself, a sex tape between the ADA and a high-profile male prison escapee would blow the fuck up; the cops would think Denzel has been an accomplice to the violent rampage of the previous week. Adding more pigs to their game of cat-and-mouse would improve the last act and the audience score with it.
18. Inside Man (2006)
I know at this point you expect me to talk about how Denzel would woo Clive Owen; or instead of slipping a diamond into Denzel’s pocket after the heist Clive gives him his digits and in mutual admiration they go on a romantic tryst after they take down a corrupt bank together. Maybe you think I’ll pluck the low hanging fruit to pun the movie’s title.
But that’s not what we need in this movie; I wouldn’t ruin the tension of one of the greatest ever heist movies with romance or puns. Hostage negotiations are tough, high-stress situations. Denzel just needs a couple little platonic pecks from Willem Dafoe’s otherwise abrasive Captain Darius to lower the heat. Just a way to silently say “Hey dude—I know we have our differences but I recognize that you’re doing your best with difficult circumstances.”
That brief humanizing moment would be worth a solid 10% jump in the ratings.
17. Gladiator II (2024)
The film that sparked the controversy. The reason this list exists.
Is it a good movie? Yes. As good as the 1st Gladiator? No.
Would a kiss have made the difference? We’ll never know.
I’m not going to spoil much, but he does platonically kiss a senator in the movie and it’s very natural—but that’s not who Denzel’s quote was about. There’s actually ambiguity in who he “kissed before killing” but we probably won’t find out who it was in the director’s cut. The moment lays forever abandoned on the cutting room floor.
I guess Ridley Scott chose to make Denzel’s portrayal a little more reserved by choosing which of his kisses would make the big screen. But why choose at all? Let the man act. Kiss all the guys. Pedro Pascal, Paul Mescal, Joseph Quinn and his even creepier brother, give some smooches to that skunk Viggo, greet all the Praetorian guards with kisses. It’s ancient Rome, they were getting way freakier than that. It’s a damning indictment of our filmmakers that they’ll show the horrors of the Colosseum but not the love of the men whose lives revolved around it. We want gay kisses.
16. Out of Time (2003)
Denzel is a cop again who gets recruited by FBI nerds to use their time portal to find information about a crime before he runs Out of Time because they can only look back exactly 4½ days. It’s a race against the clock as he retraces his steps and experiences deja—hold on. Wrong movie.
16. Deja Vu (2006)
Denzel is a cop again who gets recruited by FBI nerds to use their time portal to find information about a crime before he runs out of time because they can only look back exactly 4½ days. It’s a race against the clock as he retraces his steps and experiences Deja Vu while examining his own life choices on the fateful day of a terrorist attack. If they bend the rules, they can send notes back to their former selves through the portal which then gets relayed back to the future as answers useful to the investigation.
Everyone who has been working on the project for years is convinced time is a closed loop and cannot be changed, but Denzel who has been on the case for like one day convinces the team to send him through the portal to try to save the hot DEA agent from 2 Guns. But—what if Denzel goes back, meets himself, gets enthralled by his own charm, that derails the plot, and they end up having their first kiss with an exploding ferry in the backdrop? That would be great commentary on the toxic downstream effects of his narcissism.
15. The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Fun movie but doesn’t really vibe as a classic western—more like a modern action movie with 1800s set dressing—so it never feels like a successor to its 1960s namesake or the original Seven Samurai. Devoid of emotional depth and moral ambiguity, it’s basically just a bunch of high profile actors having fun with guns, bows, and knives… which is all a generic popcorn flick needs to be, but less than this remake should have been.
Denzel’s character is not a particular stand out, he’s the de facto leader recruiting more unique characters to get the job done. So that leaves the burning question: who can Denzel kiss to make his role more memorable? Will it be the charming gambler Chris Pratt? A bearhug with a bonus to greet his old mountain man friend Vincent D’Onofrio? Reprisal smooch with Ethan Hawke to calm the lingering shellshock of Training Day? Maybe Byung-hun Lee shows him how fast he really is in a quick kiss duel? Some love to warm the coldhearted Comanche, or perhaps a quick peck on the outlaws cheek to break the tension when they first meet?
Yes. All of them. And to make it a truly magnificent seven, he steals a kiss on the barman when he’s whispering in that one scene, too. Everyone gets a kiss except Haley Bennett because that would be unprofessional.
14. Crimson Tide (1995)
Is there anything more romantic than being trapped in a nuclear submarine with a hundred other sailors—half of whom want to hang you for mutiny or treason? Well, maybe there’s a few things higher on that list but it’s what we’re dealing with here as captain Gene Hackman and his executive officer Denzel battle over command when the order to launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike is interrupted by a vague retraction.
Crimson Tide is an excellent film, and I’ll be the first to admit it would not be better if Denzel and Hackman kissed. That would be silly, there’s no way to do it without heavily disrupting the perfect tension of the film. It actually makes more sense if they’re both having gay affairs with Viggo Mortensen, the ship’s Weapons Officer, and their exposed love triangle adds fuel to their fiery feud. Torn between two lovers, Viggo chooses to side with Denzel to regain control of the ship, a decision validated when an unhinged Hackman threatens to shoot seamen.
Perfection.
13. The Preacher’s Wife (1996)
See here’s a couple actual romance films; I think you’ll agree they aren’t as hot as a submarine.
In this one God sends his angel, Denzel, to save a struggling church in New York by helping the pastor and his wife, Whitney Houston. But that’s an issue: Denzel is super charming and who wouldn’t fall in love with Whitney Houston? Even giving Denzel a dorky name like Dudley wasn’t enough to turn down the heat. The preacher takes notice that his wife and this alleged angel are getting mighty close and everyone forgets about the church plot.
We needed a way to spoil their chemistry and we get the perfect moment when Denzel and Whitney are on a date in a jazz lounge when Lionel Richie coaxes her to the stage to sing I Believe In You And Me. Instead of Denzel falling deeper in love with Whitney—the movie would be way better if he’s entranced by Lionel’s piano serenade. God was okay with him wooing a married woman, but dating a guy goes against the religion. So Denzel renounces his angelic responsibilities then the gentlemen elope to San Francisco.
Meanwhile, the jilted Whitney goes back to be with the preacher and they rekindle their relationship over a shared hatred of Denzel and together they save the church. That’s a lot better but it’s still limited by the familiar yet weird premise.
12. Missississippippi Masala (1991)
This is such a beautiful movie, but tons of actors could have made it work. I think that’s the real reason why there aren’t many romances in Denzel’s film catalog. His on-screen relationships are usually side stories to bigger plots because filmmakers realized early on that he can tentpole much larger narratives that require much wider range. He can do it all so they put him in roles where it’s all needed.
But if Mississippi Masala had been a bigger box office success he could have had a totally different career trajectory; and a couple small tweaks may have made the difference. There’s an alternate universe where the plot of this film doesn’t play out between Denzel and a young Indian refugee expelled from Uganda—but a young man, instead. Gender swap Mina to Mino, it’s that easy. Not only would the couple be challenging the racial prejudices of their community, but they’d be kicking down the door of 1980s homophobia, too.
11. The Bone Collector (1999)
This is what I’m talking about with Denzel’s romantic side stories. Him and Angelina Jolie totally have something developing here but it’s not really part of the plot.
Denzel is a genius forensics expert who is paralyzed and suicidal out of fear that his condition may one day worsen and leave him in a fully vegetative state. In the climax of Bone Collector, a bed-bound Denzel is confronted by the film’s Machiavellian serial killer—revealed to be Leland Orser, a former dirty cop who was imprisoned after Denzel exposed his rampant evidence planting. The killer arranged an elaborate sequence to defeat Denzel intellectually, ruin his career, then finally kill him… yeah, that’s starting to sound familiar.
Do you know what would have elevated this grim, formulaic cat-and-mouse detective movie? A big kiss. Denzel compliments the intricacies of Leland’s scheme then Leland admits he did it all to impress the country’s foremost investigator. He climbs into Denzel’s medical bed where their passionate kiss washes away the years of trauma Marcus endured behind bars. Angelina shows up to cuff Leland, who is promptly sent to prison again—but this time, they become penpals which gives them both something positive to live for.
10. Stuff I Never Watched
Okay, there’s a bunch of Denzel movies that I haven’t seen. Way more than I thought when pitching this list to my editor. I genuinely thought I’d seen them all because I had never even heard of these films… probably because none of them have a gay kiss. Throw a smooch in there between Denzel and one of the other dudes and they wouldn’t be languishing in filmography obscurity. Any one of them could have been iconic must-watches.
9. Book of Eli (2010)
Denzel is blind the whole time. That’s the big twist at the end. He’s been doing all this cool wasteland action stuff while blind; completely navigated by divine purpose to deliver and dictate a braille Bible so a new cycle of Christian proselytizing can begin. It’s a movie which gets worse each time you rewatch it because most scenes make less sense the more you think about them.
So you know what would be a way better twist? That’s right—a bunch of gay kisses at the end, because Denzel wasn’t blind and he wasn’t even sent by God. He’s just a badass on a mission: his objective was never to preserve the Bible… he wants to edit it. He makes some changes then delivers the good word so the next generations of religious zealots can be gay, too.
8. John Q (2002)
This critic score is insane.
The links between big pharma and big critique have never been laid more bare—clearly they were trying to suppress this scathing look at the American healthcare system where Denzel must hold up an emergency room to save his son, Michael.
A bunch of gay kisses would have forced those bought reviewers into an ultimatum: scoring for their dark money puppet-masters would mean denying the barrier-busting storytelling. How could they deny the power of Denzel smooching a doctor, a gangster, an expectant father, the worst sniper ever, and a police chief? Each dude immediately understands the depths of Denzel’s compassion during the kiss as if his love was contagious. Michael wouldn’t have been the only one with a change of heart. But it was the early 2000s so while it would have elevated John Q to a solid 82% critic score the audience score would have plummeted to 40%.
7. Remember the Titans (2000)
No excuse for this one, the critics are just stupid. This is the best football movie ever! Which isn’t saying much, most of them are pretty bad. It’s only as good as it is because, more important than the sports, this is a thin slice of the civil rights movement—but we wanted the whole cake, and the director dropped the ball. Instead of just tackling racial segregation and prejudices, what if the team tore down sexuality barriers too? They varsity blueballed us! Everyone knows what the movie needed to get that 100% critic score.
A macho multiracial orgy bursting with testosterone during halftime would make this great film the greatest film; a Hollywood blockbuster that wouldn’t need a catchy title to be remembered. Denzel kisses Will Patton to role model their bond to the whole team and things escalate quickly from there. “But what about the football game?!” Who cares, dude. The rest of the movie is graphic gay sex scenes between the consenting seniors who have reached the age of majority. We don’t need a fourth quarter comeback because the quarterback comes four times.
Editor’s Note: The writer of this article was not aware this film was yet another true story. Hard Drive apologizes to Herman Boone and any former T.C. Williams High School students depicted in Remember the Titans (2000).
6. The Manchurian Candidate (2004)
This is a great movie with a phenomenal, committed cast. The majority of the low scores, from critics and audience, are because people are nostalgic for the iconic 1960s Sinatra adaptation which was more faithful to the source material novel. It’s an unavoidable comparison because many of the differences are superficial, the Denzel version merely sheds its Red Scare skin to swaddle in a globalist conspiracy cloak instead.
What we really needed was a complete upheaval of the formula, something so drastic that watchers would have no choice but to regard it as its own movie. So here we go: Liev Schreiber and Denzel are lovers from the start; we get a kiss 30 seconds into the movie just before their recon mission is ambushed—the whole unit gets brainwashed to erase the gay relationship from their collective consciousness, replacing it with the heroic deeds that would make the “straight” Schreiber a war hero primed for vice presidency.
Denzel and Schreiber are worlds apart but of a single heart and mind. They can’t shake the dreams of their time together, they both resist their programming to go on revenge rampages quest for the truth. Schreiber kills Meryl Streep and the other corrupt politicians while Denzel cuts his way through a shadow government wing of the military industrial complex. They meet again at last while they both kill executives in a Manchurian Global headquarters. The two men—broken apart, whole together—end the movie the same as it started.
5. Man on Fire (2004)
The story of a hardened former cop-turned-manny bodyguard for Dakota Fanning who softens his heart. Denzel becomes a surrogate father in the absence of her millionaire parents—until she’s kidnapped in an insurance fraud ransom scheme to pay off her family’s debts. Denzel’s state of mind unravels as quick as the plot, turning to torture and even killing to get back the only light in his life.
Critics hate this movie.
Their biggest complaint is that it’s too long: about two and a half hours of uneven pacing. Well… fuck them, this movie is awesome. So let’s extend the alternate ending out by another two hours. Denzel saves Dakota and her mom and they all move back to Texas together where we get a long montage of her growing up with them as positive parental influences. Denzel falls in love with Dakota’s highschool swim coach, hopefully played by Eric Bana, and the movie ends with them kissing at their recently-legalized same sex marriage.
4. The Equalizers (2014-2023)
The Equalizer movies are decent. Sure, retired supercop uses his special skills to become a champion for the helpless is not breaking any new narrative ground, but it’s a tired setup elevated by Denzel’s acting and even some good choreography—when you can figure out what’s going on between the close shots, quick cuts, and abysmal lighting. But it’s missing something… something that every great brooding vigilante crime-fighter needs: a flamboyant sidekick!
The first movie ends with Denzel checking online ads for his next jobs. Too pulpy. Instead he hires the son of Melissa Leo, his former DEI colleague, to be his social media manager who gets new jobs from Twitter (it was still called Twitter back then). Portrayed by Glen Powell, the character breaks the fourth wall to dub himself “The Sequelizer.” Together they expand the trilogy into a decalogy with a new entry every single year. We lean into the formula, but add a little more romantic depth each time to distinguish the series from its contemporaries.
Love transcends their age difference as they find true companionship while kicking ass and taking names—for justice. The seven other movies develop their fire-and-ice buddy cop antics into a bromance which culminates in a same-sex marriage proposal. Denzel is actually in Sicily for their wedding when the events of Equalizer 10 (née 3) play out—and Dakota Fanning is in this movie too. This gives her a more involved plot; she’s now torn between duties of being a CIA agent, a vigilante’s accomplice, and the bridesmaid for her brother The Sequelizer.
3. Safe House (2012)
Ryan Reynolds
2. The Siege (1998)
Honestly, arguably career-worst performances from both Bruce Willis and Denzel Washington. They’re both too stuffy, however, with the right script they wouldn’t be phoning it in. First off, cut out all the scenes of offensive Muslim stereotypes. That should give us at least 30 minutes of runtime to rework into a love story.
The movie now opens on two college roommates sharing a cot at West Point. It starts getting steamy but the sloppy kisses are punctuated by questions about their future—personal and professional—until the conversation spills into a lover’s quarrel. Young Bruce storms out of the dorm when his closest confidant, Denzel, reveals he has abandoned his military pursuits and has already applied for conscientious objector status. Twenty years later, Bruce is a US Army General while Denzel has struggled through the ranks of the FBI. Their torn relationship forms the B plot as they’re forced together again by circumstance: the FBI is investigating the major terrorist cell responsible for hundreds of deaths in New York which has resulted in the army, under Bruce’s command, sealing off Brooklyn after the president declares martial law.
The men are at each other’s throats the whole movie, their breakup has pulled them further apart ideologically: Denzel’s rejection made him more compassionate while Bruce used the betrayal to fuel a cold, uncompromising demeanor with racist undertones. Every moment between them is steeped in layers of love and loathing. Instead of two wooden performances we get fiery accusations, coded references, and painful insults beyond anything that could have happened in the original movie. Would they bookend the film with a reconciling kiss at the end? We’ll never know.
1. Fallen (1998)
Here we go, the biggest kiss improvement.
I love Fallen. It’s genuinely one of my favorite detective movies. The cast is fantastic and the central conceit is unique… but I would never describe it as a “great” movie. Although it is an interesting blend of psychological-supernatural-noir thriller, it’s also corny as hell and falls back on genre tropes which unintentionally feel like a parody at times. For the uninitiated: Denzel is a cop (again) who is hounded by a convict he locked up years ago (again) and gets accused of crimes he didn’t commit (again) as he balances his personal life with the high-stakes career that brings him into contact with dangerous individuals (again).
But that’s where the plot distinguishes itself because the villain isn’t just some ruthless criminal, it’s actually an immortal demon named Azazel who can transfer his soul at will into new hosts through physical contact. If the host is killed he has a short-range ethereal form that can possess without true contact. He’s like a contagious murder virus who sings The Rolling Stones. It’s an insane premise. He uses that power to taunt Denzel by infecting strangers, colleagues, even his family members. At one point, Denzel is provoked into shooting Azazel’s current host then he possesses eyewitnesses to give false reports to turn the police department on our man.
The paranoia afforded by the concept had the opportunity to elevate this film above any conspiracy or corruption cop movie—but it fell short. Critics want more depth. I can fix it.
Instead of transferring the soul on any physical contact we make it lip-based magic and ditch the deus ex machina ethereal form altogether. Azazel escapes the prison after the execution when the coroner brushes the corpse’s lips with his bare hand. The story remains largely the same after that, but now Azazel has to charm people into kisses to exchange new physical forms if he wants to tantalize Denzel. He finally reaches the inner circle of the police department by infecting James Gandolfini who hooks up with a sex worker as he investigates what they think is a copycat murder of the recently executed serial killer.
It starts as a simple quest for revenge: Azazel is bitter that Denzel caught his favorite host, so now wants to infect Denzel to frame him for murder. But he soon discovers it won’t be so easy—even the combined charm of an incubus and pre-Sopranos Gandolfini aren’t enough to woo a drunk Denzel. Azazel kisses his way through the whole police force trying to find anyone who can get close enough to smooch the hard-to-get detective. Frustrated by his failures, he reveals himself in the iconic office scene; modified to be singing and kissing, of course.
Same as the theatrical release, our Denzel chases Azazel out of the police department and gets provoked into killing a civilian—but this time the soul is transferred when a bystander tries mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on the demon’s dying host. Instead of leaving false reports, Azazel escapes with the information he collected as a police officer to track down Denzel’s family. He infects Denzel’s nephew when he gets kissed by another student at school, who then passes the soul to his dad in a goodnight kiss, who then catches his brother Denzel unaware.
We get a few scenes of Denzel trying to fight back against the demon, a war between light and dark souls, before succumbing to the corruption and being forced to witness numerous murders. Azazel brazenly leaves his fingerprints and plenty of eyewitnesses at the scene of each crime before transferring his soul back into the wild so he can safely spectate Denzel’s downfall. The rest of the movie plays out largely the same: Donald Sutherland and John Goodman chase Denzel to an isolated cabin where he plans to trap the demon with his suicide. And it almost works—foiled by a curious stray cat licking the tears from his face.
From 4 to a 10. Fallen would have swept the awards. We missed out on Denzel performing Time is On My Side at the Oscars because Hollywood is full of visionless prudes. Let him act.
