Bright Lights Film Journal

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Actors & Personalities · Silents

0

Eternal Child: The Many Meanings of a Mask (on Stan Laurel)

  • September 1, 1996

Laurel’s mask – the goofy, sweet-natured grown-up child – had its roots in the classic commedia dell’arte. The reasons why Stan Laurel is always entered in film annals as an[…]

Actors & Personalities · Silents

3

Stealing the Clown’s Clothes: Stan Laurel’s Relationship with Chaplin

  • September 1, 1996

Chaplin’s most famous “creation” was his little tramp – but Stan Laurel did it first, as Chaplin knew all too well. One of the most troubling aspects of Stan Laurel’s[…]

Actors & Personalities · Asian · Historical & Epic · Reviews

0

“Richer Films . . .” Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai (1954)

  • September 1, 1996

This epic set in the 16th century deals with war, honor, courage, and yes, that homo subtext ever present in male bonding movies – punctuated by Toshiro Mifune’s bold butt-baring[…]

Horror · Reviews

0

Half Human, Half Garbage Disposal: The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996)

  • September 1, 1996

See Val Kilmer feed psychedelic mushrooms to the crazed beast-people! See Aissa’s forbidden jungle dance! See the terrible white monster who lumbers across the sets in pancake makeup and Bea[…]

Experimental & Underground · LGBT & Queer · Reviews

0

“An Oasis of Glamor in a Sea of Mediocrity”: Vegas in Space (1991)

  • September 1, 1996

John Waters, Zsa Zsa Gabor, The Bad Seed, Supermarionation – the late Doris Fish trawled through the lowest depths of culture for her homemade camp fairy tale. Drag queen diva Doris Fish[…]

Directors · Documentaries · Experimental & Underground · Reviews

0

Tender Fictions: Barbara Hammer’s Truth Club

  • September 1, 1996

Barbara Hammer continues the groundbreaking investigations into gender that started with Nitrate Kisses – this time using autobiography to tell her truths. Barbara Hammer is best known for her groundbreaking[…]

Documentaries · Experimental & Underground · LGBT & Queer · Reviews

0

“There Was No Before!” The Queen (1968)

  • September 1, 1996

This grimy, exciting artifact from the ’60s shows how important beauty contests were to the queens who ruthlessly – and kind of sadly – mimicked their straight counterparts. The rank[…]

Documentaries · LGBT & Queer · Reviews

0

Gay Cuba: Beating the Bully

  • September 1, 1996

The U.S. must eventually come to its senses and leave this little island and its vital citizens alone. Americans’ view of Cuba is based more on the right wing’s mythmaking (a process[…]

Actors & Personalities · Pre-Code · Producers & Studios · Reviews

0

Public Enemy: Warner Bros. in the Pre-Code Era

  • September 1, 1996

Nobody “did” the Depression, or sexual excess, or populist uprisings, better than the Brothers Warner. Conventional wisdom says that before the taboo-busting ’60s, all deviance in American filmmaking was suppressed.[…]

Pre-Code · Reviews

0

Fuck Housework! The Bad Girls of M-G-M, 1932

  • September 1, 1996

Harlow, Bankhead, yes, even patrician Norma Shearer “strayed” before the Hays Code ended their fun. Feminist film historians usually focus on Warners and RKO as the prime exponents of the “bad girl” genre[…]

Asian · Reviews

0

Supercop (1992): Letting Jackie Be Jackie

  • August 1, 1996

Jackie’s almost eclipsed by the great Michelle Khan. Watch out for that building! Supercop is the second crucial step, after Rumble in the Bronx, in the repackaging of Asian superstar Jackie Chan for American[…]

Directors · Exploitation & Erotica · LGBT & Queer

0

It’s an Ed Wood World After All!

  • April 12, 1996

The “world’s worst director” never apologized for wearing women’s clothes, though many have questioned his taste in sweaters. The story goes that Disney Studios threw Tim Burton a bone in[…]

Actors & Personalities · Silents

1

Meet Asta Nielsen: Gender-Bending Silent Star Who “Taught Me Everything I Know” (Garbo)

  • April 1, 1996

“Asta brings a subtle twist to her version of Hamlet not by playing a man, but by playing a woman disguised as a man, adding another level of gender complexity.”[…]

LGBT & Queer · Reviews

2

William Friedkin’s Cruising

  • April 1, 1996

The 2014 release of James Franco’s Interior. Leather Bar. reminds us it’s time to revisit the still-notorious film that inspired it.  * * * History shows us how easily yesterday’s[…]

Exploitation & Erotica · Reviews

0

Russ Meyer’s Faster Pussycat, Kill! Kill!

  • April 1, 1996

Stand back when ballooned-up, masacara-drenched go-go girls leave the confines of their cages for a murderous desert rampage! A cornerstone of both camp and punk cultures — no mean feat[…]

Actors & Personalities · Asian · Reviews

1

Jackie Chan: Rumble in the Bronx

  • April 1, 1996

Jackie invades America for the second time. Is America finally ready? Jackie Chan’s “newest” film, Rumble in the Bronx, is only new to U.S. audiences. This film was released in 1994[…]

Actors & Personalities

0

Queen Norma – Shearer, That Is

  • April 1, 1996

M-G-M’s nearly forgotten Queen of the Lot is enjoying a mini-revival America was built on a vague egalitarianism that scorned the worship of kings and queens, and no wonder —[…]

Actors & Personalities · Documentaries · Reviews

0

Mark Rappaport’s From The Journals of Jean Seberg

  • April 1, 1996

Literally burned by Preminger, driven crazy by an army of husbands, hangers-on, and J. Edgar Hoover, Jean Seberg lives on in a new documentary Jean Seberg was always more icon[…]

LGBT & Queer · Reviews

0

The Birdcage: Albert, the titular bird, is more emu than eagle – the poor thing never learns to fly

  • April 1, 1996

Queen alert! Seemingly respectable filmmakers are eagerly repackaging homosexuals as whining, pathetic drag queens for a culture disturbed by sex plagues and nose-ringed militants. If last year’s To Wong Foo led the charge, The Birdcage delivers[…]

Betty Boop

Animation

0

Betty Boop

  • April 1, 1996

With a head like a giant peanut, vast mascara’d eyes, too-kissable lips, baby-doll voice (courtesy of singer Mae Questel), flattened marcelled hair, and mere threads of a dress exposing miles[…]

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