Tag: Movies

Well, that was different! In this show 5 short films were each paired with one piece of performance art (spoken word, dance, song, music) right there in the theatre. Short films + performance art + artist Q&A = Awesome!

In My Heart The Travel Agent, a very short collage of sounds and scenes from subways/metros around the world is incorporated by Isolde N. Barron into a catchy dance number to ATC’s Around the World.

Trans man Kyle Shaughnessy responds to Dyke Pussy, a weird short of little cat figurines, with a powerful demand for respect and desire for his front-facing man-hole. In the Q&A he admits the title of the film is what prompted the angry rant. Something less cisgendered and more inclusive might have led to something tamer and more explicitly political.

After You Are A Lesbian Vampire hilariously deconstructs the romance of vampirism, Swann Barat and Lise Monique Oakley pick up the vampire theme with an eerie drumming number, complete with rich red sheets, black dresses and a mock vampire bite at the end.

No Safe Words is a disturbing collage mixing sports, bondage, muscleboys on Pride floats and frat hazing. Jesse McMass-Sparvier then performs a wordless interpretive dance to the repeated soundtrack. The theme was oppression and bondage, both physical and cultural. However, I don’t think it added anything really new.

In Invitation, Michael V. Smith invites us to get naked with him, and to love our bodies—or at least get a new perspective on them. This one hit particularly hard because my body’s not too different from Michael’s, and I’ve dealt with similar demons. Joel Klein and Karen Lee-Morgan run with the theme of brutal honesty with a funny song urging you to tell everything—everything—to your partner.

It’s no secret I’m a sucker for a good twisty mind-fuck. Hell, I’m the only one of my friends who really liked Pornography: A Thriller, let alone thought it was the best film of the festival last year. I also have fond memories of Half-Life from the year before, which similarly left a lot of people scratching their heads.

Strapped wasn’t quite up to the level of these two films. The mind-fuck wasn’t that twisty, the writing itself took itself a little too seriously, and the symbolism was too heavy-handed. Not that it stopped me from enjoying the movie.

The film starts with a man taking a hustler up to his apartment. After their encounter (which leaves his client relaxed and happy and feeling “free”), the hustler collects his money, steals a small figurine of a griffon, and tries to leave the apartment building—but can’t. Exit signs point to dead ends, corridors all look alike. After a bit of wandering he finds stairs, but is accosted by a man who calls him “Eddie” (not the name he gave his client; I think that was “Alex”), insists he knows him, and invites him to his place down the hall. The hustler (oh hell, let’s call him Eddie for now) decides to play along, which includes matching his new friend Leon’s campier behaviour.

At the party Eddie strips (for money), blows one of the guys (for more money) and then leaves. Wandering the halls some more he’s accosted by a hunky young father who agrees to show him the way out, but really wants to take him down to the laundry room to suck his dick and lick his ass. And then punch him in the nose. Eddie is saved by the arrival of a nice older gentleman who takes him up to his place in the attic, then fills him (and the audience) in a little on the nature of the building.

Eddie, it seems is stuck in some kind of maze or labyrinth. Not the same concept, as Jeff, the older gentleman, exposits: a maze is a trap, designed to lead you astray and hide the way out. A labyrinth, on the other hand, is a journey with no choices, no confusion. You have to keep going and eventually you’ll reach your destination. Eddie, Jeff says, is “lost” but the young father who attacked him is “trapped”—in lies, in false labels and names.

And then they fuck. Seems to be a recurring theme. On his way down the stairs Eddie meets Gary, one of the people at Leon’s party, who also invites him to his place. Gary admits that he’s intensely attracted to Eddie, has actually dreamed about him, and wants to kiss him. For money. No fucking, no blowing, just five minutes of making out to fill a hole in Gary’s soul. Eddie initially refuses, since kissing is far too intimate for him, but Gary keeps offering him more money, and he finally accepts.

They make out, and it’s apparently transcendant. So good, in fact, that they both have spontaneous orgasms with their pants still on. Gary is satisfied, both physically and spiritually, and Eddie himself is awed by the experience. Before leaving he gives Gary the griffon figurine he stole, and easily finds the way out: a very ritzy-looking spiral staircase, leading down to a rather pretty lobby. But before stepping out into the sunlit street, Eddie makes a choice: he runs back up the stairs, back into Gary’s arms.

The end.

So… that was kind of interesting. It had some good elements, but in hindsight I don’t think they really meshed together. In my original tweet I called this movie “Jacob’s Ladder with hustlers”, and I stand by that. Whereas Jacob was going through a kind of purgatory and needed to ascend to heaven (I think; I mean, that movie was seriously ambiguous), Strapped tacked on elements of spiritual awakening through sex that kinda left me cold. Plus, some symbols really didn’t add up. What about the rain and leaky roof in Jeff’s attic apartment? Did it represent his higher spiritual awareness (because, hey, attic) and openness to the true outside world? What exactly did the griffon represent? Eddie was trapped in the building after he stole it, and found the way out after he gave it up. What should I read into this? Was it attachment, possession, harmful patterns in Eddie’s life that he had to choose to break?

And who were all these other characters? Souls also lost or trapped, or manifestations of the building existing only for Eddie, serving as obstacles or spiritual stations on his journey? Gyorgy, Eddie’s first client, felt “free” after getting fucked and spilling his guts and true name, implying that he was real, and would find his way out soon. If, then, all the other characters are real, is the building just a metaphor for life, and the quest for enlightenment? If so, what does it say about Eddie that he chose to stay? Is love better than enlightenment?

Am I totally overthinking this? Ehh, maybe. That’s okay, though. I had fun watching the movie, and fun writing this review, and that’s what counts, right?

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!