Tag: Vancouver Queer Film Festival

A few short films on the theme of love and rejection.

I’m In The Mood For Love

A singing telegram in a restaurant to try to win your ex back? The singer was way cute and had a lovely voice, but the film was so-so. Nice hat, though!

Teddy

A teddy bear becomes a symbol of a failed relationship. I’m not sure what I should read from the subtext: did Neil really want to keep the teddy bear? Would keeping it mean that he and his ex (Peter?) really were through? Or that he’d have no more reason to visit New Zealand? I’ll tell you, though, I did get emotional when I saw the teddy sitting all alone at the train station!

A Dragged-Out Affair

The first rule of drag is: drag queens do not fall in love with each other! In this pants-wettingly hilarious film, two queens from rival clubs fall for each other and start a war between their respective clans. Slapfights, hyper-stylised dance-offs, hilarity and arson ensue. Also, I learned how drag queens make love. It apparently involves locks and keys and feathers.

Single Mother

Another bit of over-the-top silliness. Our unnamed hero wants to have a child so badly he’ll do almost anything—nannying, adoption. But is he destined to go through increasingly weird dreams of babies just out of reach? Will our hero ever find a child to love, or will a hunky father move in next door and start a family with him? Oh, sorry, did I just spoil it?

Go-Go Reject

Skinny geeks represent! Daniel dreams of being a go-go dancer, but no club will hire him because he’s too skinny. Undaunted, he puts together his own dance troupe of skinny guys and shows everyone that sexy comes in all sizes.

(Although let’s face it, the actors are only skinny compared to the usual buff go-go boys. I still appreciate the message!)

I didn’t originally plan to go see this movie, since it looked a little too grim and gritty for my taste. But then I ended up winning tickets at the Summer Fling grass tournament last week so hey, I guess I was going to see it after all!

Gun Hill Road is the story of three people: Enrique, recently out of prison and trying to rebuild his life; his bright and creative son Michael, who is transitioning into Vanessa; Enrique’s wife Angela, the ever-suffering voice of reason, determined to keep the family together and protect Vanessa.

I was right, this was definitely a challenging movie. Enrique’s stubborn macho pride crashes head-on into Vanessa’s insistence to live life her own way, and the hard realities of working for a living and putting up with idiot bosses.

And, even more tragically, Enrique wastes no time getting together with his old posse, and getting up to the same tricks that got him sent “up North” in the first place. Even worse was beating the crap out of another ex-con, which ended up getting him arrested again. There’s a lot that wasn’t said, but it’s implied that Enrique was raped in prison, more pain that a macho guy like him can only express through violence and fierce control.

Not that Vanessa comes out a whole lot better, in my opinion, because she also does a whole lot of stupid shit. Some of it can be excused by her youth and naivete, but really, getting shot up with bootleg hormones and whatever the hell that stuff was to give her a fuller ass? On the other hand, her experience with her boyfriend was as much exploring her sexuality as anything else, and she does eventually find self-respect.

Enrique and Vanessa do eventually take the first steps towards reconciliation, or at least lack of conflict, but by then it’s far too late. And I started wondering, was this all for nothing? Has Enrique made too many mistakes that he can no longer find his way? Has Vanessa learned anything from their brief truce, or is she more convinced than ever that her life’s better off without an overbearing father? A bit depressing, maybe, but that’s life. There are no easy answer, only choices, and their consequences.

And we’re off! The VQFF started with… well, not a bang, exactly, but a nice low-key burn. To Faro is a subtitled German film (original title: Mein Freund Aus Faro, or My Friend From Faro) about a young butch lesbian who falls in love with a teenage girl (who thinks she’s a guy named Miguel) while her oblivious family thinks she’s dating a guy. Also named Miguel.

This was an interesting movie, about one-third comedy and two-thirds drama. I almost called it a tragedy, because you can see the shit coming a mile away, but that’d be a little over the top. Still, even though the queer character doesn’t die at the end (hey, progress!), this is not a movie where the girl gets the girl. As much as I hoped for a happy ending*, there was no way Mel and Jenny would end up together.

(* The VQFF site described it as “Boys Don’t Cry with a happy ending”. Yeah. No.)

It wasn’t an entirely sad ending, mind you, just… bittersweet, and very open-ended. Mel decides she’s had enough of her empty life, the go-nowhere job she just quit, the family that doesn’t understand her, the homophobic snots surrounding the love interest who doesn’t love her back, and decides to pack up and move to Portugal. To Faro, in particular, where both her imaginary Miguels come from? Will Nuno, her partner in lies, join her in her travels, or will he talk her into staying? We don’t know, and I suspect we’re supposed to write our own endings.

Which is okay with me, and I have a feeling Mel will be all right. She’s tasted love, and tasted heartbreak, and has something to shoot for besides lying in fields, watching planes take off and land.

PS: And hey, this was my first VQFF opening gala! The movie was preceded by a couple speeches, and a showing of the very very awesome winner of the Out in Schools Anti-Homophobia PSA contest, the very very awesome makers of which were in the audience.

PPS: And then I swung by Club 560 for the opening gala party, but I didn’t stay long. I did enjoy the technicolor cotton candy, though!

This is the story of Lala, the teenaged daughter of a rich Buenos Aires judge, and her lover Ailin, a maid in her family’s house. The pair plans to to run away together to Ailin’s family home in Paraguay near Lago Ypoa, but when Lala’s father is murdered under mysterious circumstances, Ailin takes the blame to protect her lover. What will happen to them now? Can they escape the law and live out their dreams?

The Fish Child is a magnificent movie, and the above summary really doesn’t do it justice. The synopsis says “[Director Lucía] Puenzo makes a conscious decision not to make the clandestine lesbian love story the central dilemma. Any stigma attached to the Lala’s sexual orientation is secondary to the obstacles imposed by Argentina’s sharp class divide.” And it’s true: nobody’s really shocked at the girls’ relationship, but Ailin has had to endure emotional and sexual abuse from Lala’s father, her own father, the police commissioner, not to mention being a poor member of a racial minority.

But the movie also speaks of the power of love and dreams to take us through those trials. Lala’s plans to escape with Ailin and build a little house by Lake Ypao may seem naive, but after they’re on the run it’s all they have. Maybe that’s enough; the movie leaves that an open question, and that’s okay.

This hasn’t been an easy review to write. A lot of scenes are pretty dark and disturbing, and the exact timeline of events was a bit hard to follow at first. The movie uses flashbacks a lot, and drops the viewers right in the middle of the story. Plus, this is a movie with layers, a lot of which I’m sure I haven’t gotten right now, but which will become clear on a second viewing.

Well, that was pretty good: an odd little love triangle out of Argentina, with some very cute moments, excellent acting, and nice cinematography.

The story is that Bruno’s ex, Laura (who he still wants to get back together with), has a new boyfriend, Pablo. Perhaps intending revenge, perhaps just to sabotage their relationship to leave Laura available to him, Bruno starts making friends with Pablo, but the two eventually fall for each other.

I think what really stands out in this movie were the little moments. The two men bonding over a favourite TV show. Asking each other “If you were a toy, what kind of toy would you be?”—and later, as things get a little more serious, buying each other those same toys. Pablo quietly breaking into tears upon realising the game Bruno was playing. The mutual undressing scene near the end, so hilariously awkward. There was a spark there, but the men still didn’t quite know what to do with it. I don’t know if the actors were straight or just damn good at their jobs, but they really sold that scene.

Though some things were lost in translation. I’m not talking about the subtitles, but the style and aesthetics. Like most South American movies I’ve seen, Plan B’s pace is very slow, with loving attention paid to cinematography—either the beach, or the cityscapes. There was a bit near the end where, for a couple of minutes, the movie was nothing but a slow collage of buildings, each cut at least ten seconds long. It just seemed so pointless, the audience was confused, and then started cracking up. To be honest, I joined them. But looking back, I can’t help wondering how South American audiences would see that bit. Maybe there’s meaning there that I’m not getting. Or it could just be self-indulgent directing, who knows?

Wow, that was… really not good at all. A deadly earnest, by-the-numbers coming out story that felt ripped straight out of an after-school special. Sensitive nerdy gay boy, check; his feisty PC fag hag BFF (not a minority, but disabled, which still counts), check; broody and tormented jock he falls for, check; gay bashing scene, check; PG-rated sex scene that’s over-the-top perfect and magical and everything, check; oppressive soundtrack that swells like The Song That Goes Like This whenever a Big Dramatic Moment comes up, check. Oh, and the jock dies at the end, having tragically succumbed to his tormenting issues. Check? Sure, why not.

Oy.

Apart from all the clichés, the movie did a lot of things wrong. First, the framing story of an adult Danny (a.k.a. Sensitive Nerdy Gay Boy) as a successful artist who got famous on paintings and drawings of Carter (a.k.a. Broody And Tormented Jock) really doesn’t work. Not only does it depressingly show him as still not over Carter’s death, it’s frankly unnecessary and distracting. The final scene of him reconciling with his boyfriend and presumably moving on for good was kind of sexy but would have been a lot more effective if we’d known anything about the boyfriend or cared about their relationship.

Speaking of sexy, Danny and Carter’s first time was… just weird. What the hell was up with the rain? Was there some kind of symbolism there, or did the director just want the actors to glisten? I don’t get it.

As for Carter, the writers did aim for “broody and tormented” but actually landed on “asshole”. Stealing from Danny’s mother to support his drug addiction was bad enough, but stealing the BFF’s crutch when they visited the museum? That wasn’t cool, it wasn’t funny, it just made him a gigantic prick who doesn’t deserve to be in the same zip code as Danny.

So yeah… this movie had potential, especially with a gay nerd main character— we sure don’t get enough of those—but it turned out to be a huge disappointment. The one serious dud of the whole festival.

This movie kicked ass! Bursting with energy, funny, some great cinematography, good character development and of course some great music (I’m not into punk, but damn, you couldn’t not like it). Educational, too: The Taqwacores served as a crash course on Islam, and a look into a culture I’m really not familiar with.

The viewpoint character is Yusef, an innocent and observant Muslim who moves into a household of Muslim punk rockers. Too punk for mainstream Muslims, too Muslim for other punks, they and many others formed their own scene and community of outsiders, calling themselves “Taqwacores”. Though at first appalled by their weird habits, Yusef finds that they are as devout as him, each in their own way; though there’s quite a bit of friction (especially with the hardcore straight-edge landlord Umar), there’s also mutual respect and openness, and they manage to live together in something like harmony.

The movie only has one queer character, and not a very major one; this is still a change from the novel on which it’s based. Along with a couple of major female characters (especially Rabeya, the “burqa girl”), he adds a nice dash of gender and queer politics into the mix.

This film by Markku Keikkinen is an expose of the Eastern European gay porn industry, focusing on a minor porn studio based in Prague, one of many that sprang up in Eastern Europe in the mid-90’s. It’s a brutally fair and unforgiving look past the fantasies, at the actual business of selling sex and the people who make it work.

What we’re seeing is, mostly, pretty messed up people and dysfunctional relationships. Of the three performers who were interviewed, two left the business after a couple of years and seem to have built a life on their own (but say they’ll never go back, and don’t want to talk about it much), but a third really went downhill, ending up homeless and tweaked out of his gourd. To be fair, he never seemed that together in the first place, but the sudden fame, money, and a 3-year relationship with the director (a man twice his age, with issues of his own) probably didn’t help.

Intentionally or not, the documentary serves as a deconstruction of the porn itself. In a few instances, viewers are treated to short clips of the interviewees in action, mostly the scene-setting and foreplay parts. To me this was not a turn-on, instead highlighting just how silly and artless these fantasies are.

During the Q&A, the director revealed that he’d shot a lot more footage, and was planning to release it on DVD to paint a broader picture. Also, that he couldn’t get access to larger studios like Bel Ami or William Higgins, specifically because his work would shatter the fantasy.

When asked if he had any interviews with young men happy in the industry, Keikkinen said yes, but only Berliners. They’re much more aware of their choices and the politics, but the culture in Eastern Europe is very different.

One scene in the movie (plus shots of several DVD covers) brought up the increase in bareback porn, but there was no subsequent discussion on HIV or other STIs, and what the studios are doing to stem it. That may be material for the subsequent DVDs. Keikkinen did mention something about a syphilis epidemic in Prague in 2006–2007, which may have been the final blow to the local porn scene, though economic realities meant it had been imploding for a while anyway.

Jason Karman hosted this movie so that, just as we buy fair trade coffee, we should also make ethical choices in the porn we consume. People are being exploited, and our dollars shouldn’t go to supporting that exploitation. Great point, and well taken. This documentary painted an incomplete picture, maybe, but was excellent food for thought, and though some hated it I found it a great addition to the VQFF lineup. Kind of an odd choice to pair it up with the ultra-fluffy Violet Tendencies, though…