Insta-famous influencer Jim Parfait (Alex Ramirès’s voice) has an obsessive superfan, Lucien (Jérémy Gillet), sneaking himself into clubs. Both, though, are vaguely aware of a disease that’s going to affect their LGBT+ community in Paris. That disease is heterosis, which turns gays straight, an infection already affecting Jim, making him lose his grotesque looking abs. And a chance meeting with Lucien has both going all over Paris to find a doctor who might cure the disease. Part of this epic journey involves both men going to different kinds of queer venues.

Jim and Lucien run into queer people who have beef with Jim. Drag queens like Glamydia (Harald Marlot) and Robear (Alexandre Brik) air out their grievances against him. But still, they reluctantly help the duo across Paris. They do this while trying to evade one of Jim’s nemesis Pavel (Francois Sagat!). He’s the perpetual runner up even if he has bigger muscles. What Lucien doesn’t know is that his prostate is the cure. And that Jim finding this doctor may put Lucien in harm’s way, maybe even death.

Jim Queen has queer viewers falling in love with it – queer people like most of our art. But critics at Cannes had mixed reactions. Many of the criticisms are fair. I’m assuming that calling it ‘simple’ may refer to its archetypes – gym queens, twinks, and etc. Sure, maybe two of the middle four acts follow the same formula of Jim going to queer venues. And when he’s there, he’s being mean to those venue’s patrons. But in fairness, those scenes highlight the divisions within a community. A community that is at risk of being apart thanks to dangerous threats.

Cr. Courtesy of Photon Films © 2026

And of course, the subcommunity stoking those divisions are conventionally attractive gay men who have both privilege and danger prone. Balancing out the titular Antihero in Jim Queen is Lucien, whose outsider status helps him see things and characters underneath facades. Lucien gets his own set of character reveals, one of them being that he’s the son of homophobic minister Christine Bayer (Elisabeth Weiner). Character design is one of this film’s ace cards, and yes, I’m partially talking about how Jim may awaken something within viewers.

The film draws abs in a way that feels grotesque without taking out the atmosphere of an otherwise fun satire about gay people. It’s equally ridiculous (complimentary) to see Jim’s abs prolapse because of heterosis and him doing crunches to combat the disease. The closeups on him being angry also shows that within every muscle queen is a normal looking guy who is repressing feelings. There are other moments of positive ridiculousness. One involves hims and Lucien in drag to hide from others who have a radical cure for heterosis. The same attention and detail goes to the character designs of Glamydia and Robear, reinforcing this fantastic queer Paris.

Jim Queen juggles a lot of balls, pun intended, like it being an AIDS metaphor, fights, its many characters, and musical numbers (un deux, trois quatre!). Having a lot of characters help in showing that queer people have to put their guards up and having to relearn kindness again. Jim isn’t the only person rescuing the community as Glamydia and Robear reluctantly help him. The cycle of goodwill begins. The same goes for Jim’s best friend Nina (Shirley Souagnon) helping Glamydie from the gays with the other radical hetero cure. This is animation. Because of this, imagination comes a long way in depicting the insides of Lucien’s mind in his hero journey. Like many films about the queer experience, everybody says love. And the film earns its way through a certain romantic scene.

Jim Queen is available to watch in select North American theatres.