FESTIVAL SEATINGS.

Your local gay and lesbian test has its own set of hot summer movie premieres

If gay and lesbian characters turn up at all in Big Summer Movies, they're generally sidekicks, subplots, or the butt of jokes--making that buff action star seem all the more hereto. Fortunately, summer is also high season for gay and lesbian film festivals, at which the queer characters are the stars.

While each gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, what-have-you festival has its own set of programmers and its own point of view, a handful of major titles invariably make their debut across the whole circuit of the gay summer rests.

What are the hot new movies to catch at this summer's events? We spoke with insiders at New York's New Festival (June 6-11), the San Francisco International Lesbian and Gay Film Festival (June 15-25), and Los Angeles's Outfest (July 6-16), getting an earful of great gay and lesbian films on the horizon:

Benjamin Smoke. This reportedly poignant, funny documentary about the eponymous Atlanta punk rocker and drag queen features cameos by Michael Stipe (whose C-Hundred Film Corp. produced the flick) mid Patti Smith.

History Lessons. The latest film from legendary lesbian experimental director Barbara Hammer (the last part of a trilogy that includes Nitrate Kisses and Tender Fictions) morphs dramatic vignettes, commercials, and archival footage from the past 100-plus years in an attempt to reclaim and rewrite lesbian history.

I'm the One That I Want. Actress-comedian Margaret Cho stars in the big-screen adaptation of her hilarious and poignant one-woman show about her quick rise to fame as the star of her own sitcom (All-American Girl) and her plummet to the depths following the show's demise. Along the way she talks about coming out to her traditional Korean parents about her gay following--and does a hysterical impersonation of her mom reading S/M porn.

101 Rent Boys. Guess who directors Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato spoke with to get the lowdown on who's buying whom in Los Angeles? Filmed in many motel rooms along Santa Monica Boulevard, the interviewees tell funny, sad, and revealing stories about their lives and their unusual job.

Queer as Folk 2. American audiences finally will see the sequel to the sexy. British TV show that was the hot ticket at many gay fests last year. Stuart, Vince, and Nathan are back, crawling through the Manchester pubs and trying to resolve the messes they're in through a 90-minute movie that series creator Russell T. Davies promises is the "absolute, definite end" to the show.