Styles stokes sexuality debate with ‘My Policeman’ premiere in Toronto

Pop superstar Harry Styles discussed the complexities of sexuality and said he found the closeted gay man he plays in 1950s drama My Policeman depressing, as his latest movie premiered at the Toronto film festival Sunday.

My Policeman is one of several LGBTQ-themed movies in what organisers have hailed as a “breakthrough” year at North America’s biggest film festival, along with Billy Eichner’s rom-com Bros and critically praised gay military drama The Inspection.

But the world premiere of Styles’s latest movie comes as the British actor-singer faces allegations from some high-profile critics of appropriating queer culture, including his gender-non-conforming fashion choices, while keeping his own sexuality ambiguous. 

Harry Styles and Emma Corrin speak onstage at the ‘My Policeman’ press conference. Photo: Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images via AFP

In the film, he plays Tom, a policeman caught in a forbidden love triangle with a young woman and an urbane art gallery curator in 1950s Britain, when homosexuality was illegal.

“I think there’s so much nuance to them, and so much complexity that comes for people in real life around sexuality and finding themselves,” Styles told a Toronto...