Those First Tries at Love
Review of the films Summer of 85 and Cicada.
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Two Tales of Two Hollywoods
Circus of Books and Hollywood, a documentary and miniseries, respectively, share an interest in the margins around Tinseltown, especially its LGBT subculture and what “hustling” means in various forms.
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Leave the Beaten Trail in Tel Aviv
SUBLET BELONGS to a small genre of movies that chart a love affair whose arc rises and falls within a narrow window of time from first meeting to final farewell. It’s all telescoped into a period of days rather than months or years—or even into a single day, as in the 1995 film Before Sunrise and its two sequels. all directed by Richard Linklater. In the case of Sublet, the action takes place over a period of five days which are conveniently numbered, dividing the film into five acts.
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Bollywood Steps Out
Released in February, Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan tells the story of two young gay men who are determined to defy parental and societal expectations and mold their own happily every afters.
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T.J. Parsell Documents Lesbians in Country Music
T.J. PARSELL’S NEW FILM Invisible: Gay Women in Southern Music opened unofficially with a private screening in Nashville in February, cosponsored by the Human Rights Campaign, Nashville Pride, and…More
A Filmmaker’s Final Words
CHANTAL AKERMAN’S memoir My Mother Laughs is similar to her films: layered, defying time and space, concerned with the quotidian. Her work is woman-centered, often lesbian-centered, and focused on describing the position of women in society, including how the oppressive forces of patriarchy inflict both physical and emotional trauma on women.
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The Sociology of Soft-Core
For Powell, even hardcore porn movies helped show viewers the emotional truth of gay male life. He argues that these films, with their improbable plots that always lead to sex and quite often to group orgies, reflect on some level the coming-out experience.
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Glen or Glenda Bent the Gender Rules in 1953
… Director Wood delivers a final message in this quasi-documentary through the inclusion of a medical consultant, a Dr. Nathan Bailey, in the final credits. There can be no doubt that the word of the medical-industrial complex is profoundly important part of the ethos of Glen or Glenda: the rationale for this inquiry—all in the interest of science!—and the source of its credibility.
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While They’re in the World
Like Sir Elton, the Material Girl is a showgirl at heart, and no less familiar with rapid outfit changes. Her latest look involves an eye patch, a black veil, and a Sergeant Pepper jacket. On Madame X, she declares “I will be gay” if gay people are “burned” before identifying with other victims of discrimination: Muslims, Africans, women, and the poor.
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Film Briefs
Short reviews of State of Pride, Vita and Virginia, Making Montgomery Clift, Adam, An Almost Ordinary Summer, and End of the Century.
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