The Barkleys of Broadway: Fred & Ginger’s Last Dance: Ten Pounds Shy of a Gem?
“You’d be hard to replace”? Damn near impossible! How hard is it to lose those last ten pounds, eh? Well, pretty damn hard, but if Ginger Rogers had been able[…]
Mr. Monk’s Moods: Tony Shalhoub Returns as the Prince of the Obsessive-Compulsives in Season Three of Monk on DVD
Funny, yes, but where are all the queers? “Mr. Punctuality, that’s what they used to call me.” “Did they call you that at college?” “No, kindergarten.” And so it goes[…]
Activist & Political · Reviews
The Nixon of Our Dreams? On Robert Altman’s Secret Honor
We loved him, we loved him not Of all the Presidents the United States has had to endure over the last couple of centuries, this country’s relationship with Richard Nixon[…]
Riefenstahl’s Heights and Wiseman’s Follies: Allegories of Flesh in Olympia and Titicut Follies
The body beautiful meets the body besieged Leni Riefenstahl and Fred Wiseman, though rarely grouped together, are in a category apart from most documentary filmmakers in that they both used[…]
Everyday Freaks and Fantasy Wars: The 2005 San Francisco International Film Festival
It was the best of times . . . Running parallel to the 48th San Francisco International Film Festival were a surprisingly large number of other celebrations of film, including[…]
Activist & Political · Festivals & Awards · Reviews
Capturing Chaos: On the 2005 Human Rights Watch Film Festival
These docs and features show a world of upheaval – and, occasionally, hope The films portray images and tell stories that most of us would rather not see or hear.[…]
Quickies: Random Short Reviews from Bobby Abate to The Whale Rider
“It’s a spring break party 24/7 365 days a year!” Bobby Abate In his online bio, queer avant-garde filmmaker Bobby Abate compares himself to Britney Spears. Like her, he says,[…]
Activist & Political · Essays · Reviews
Distribute This! Privilege (Peter Watkins, 1967, Great Britain)
Watkins’ savaging of commodified culture remains disturbingly relevant After retailing Scotland’s Jacobite rebellion of 1746 to almost universal acclaim in Culloden (1964) and, in less than a year, establishing an[…]
Activist & Political · Directors · Documentaries · Reviews
Rebel Girls: Six Documentaries by Kim Longinotto
On Dream Girls, The Day I Will Never Forget, Divorce Iranian Style, Shinjuku Boys, Gaea Girls, and Runaway The combination of reality TV and George W. Bush’s ascendancy (one wants[…]
Directors · Exploitation & Erotica · LGBT & Queer
Private Rituals Made Public: The Lost Erotica of Fred Halsted
“The whole world wears a jockstrap!” One of the late George Sanders’ greatest contributions to culture was found in an interview with Rex Reed (in the book Conversations in the[…]
Two by Jacques Becker: Casque d’or and Touchez pas au grisbi on DVD
Criterion resurrects a French master “Beckeresque” is not a word but maybe it should be. Embedded in its definition would be French director Jacques Becker (1906-1960) at his best: subtle,[…]
At War with Myself: A Word with Lars von Trier at Cannes 2005
On Manderley and more Most directors at Cannes you can meet at their hotels lining the boardwalk, for a Perrier and an interview. Not Lars von Trier, the director of[…]
Directors · Interviews · LGBT & Queer
The Kid Behind the Camera: Chatting Up Darren Stein
Put the Camera on Me‘s queer wunderkind speaks I first saw Put the Camera on Me at the 2003 San Francisco International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival, and wrote about[…]
The Human (Tragi)Comedy: Talking to Arnaud Desplechin
Of Kings and Queen and other subjects I met with Arnaud Desplechin in New York last April before a sneak preview of Kings and Queen at the BAMcinématek in Brooklyn.[…]
Documentaries · LGBT & Queer · Reviews
The Rage from Nowhere? Arthur Dong’s Licensed to Kill Interviews Murderers of Gay Men
“I’m bad, but I’m locked up.” When we think about how society reinforces its laws, we usually think of law enforcement agencies doing what they’re contracted to do in protecting[…]
After Kieślowski: Six Recent Polish Films on DVD
Of Pornography and beyond The recurring release of Krzysztof Kieslowski’s films in various collections attests to more than English speakers’ enduring love of the work of the late master: it[…]
Activist & Political · Documentaries · Experimental & Underground
Crossing the Bridge: Jenni Olson’s The Joy of Life (2005)
Navigating a haunted, and haunting, world In 1994, film historian and programmer Jenni Olson’s friend Mark Finch, a critic who was co-director with Olson of the San Francisco International Lesbian[…]
The Disturbance of the Real: Arnaud Desplechin’s Kings and Queen
How real is the director’s much-vaunted “multilayered depiction of reality”? The question is, does it frighten you more that your congenial neighbor – the one whose house has the hummingbird[…]
Thinking (and Talking) It Through: Arnaud Desplechin and Kings and Queen
“Is there anything more dazzling than the possible?” Sophisticated, high-spirited, and unpredictable, Arnaud Desplechin might be likened to a raffish, Gallic Woody Allen – the comedic aspects and neurotic energy[…]
War of the Worlds: You Win Some, You Lose Some
Steven Spielberg meets Tom Cruise (again), and things get boring (again) Leave it to Steven Spielberg to screw up an alien invasion. El Stevo’s remake of the 1953 George Pal[…]
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