SFTFF 2024 #5: Mélange of Shorts

“Mélange of Shorts” shorts program
Friday, November 15, 2024, 9:00 pm, Roxie Theater
and streaming online Nov. 18 – 24

• one | another, dir. A.B. Oddman & Rogelio Salinas, 2024 USA, 11 minutes 👏
• Body Varial, dir. Audrey Kerridge, 2023 Canada, 15 minutes 👏🛹
• The Treadmill Switcher, dir. LeeAnne Lowry, 2023 USA, 7 minutes 👏
• All the Words But the One, dir. Nava Mau, 2024 USA, 18 minutes 👏
• Love More, dir. Hayden J Frederick, 2020 USA, 4 minutes 👏
• Saturn Risin9, dir. Tiare Ribeaux & Jody Stillwater, 2024 USA, 11 minutes 👏
• Butch Dyke, dir. Cai Indermaur, 2024 USA, 4½ minutes 🙂
• Falling, dir. Mers Tran, 2020 USA, 4 minutes 👏

SFTFF 2024 #4: International

 “International” (shorts program)
Friday, November 15, 2024, 7:00 pm, Roxie Theater
and streaming online Nov. 18 – 24

• Daisy, Prophet of the Apocalypse, dir. Venus Patel, 2023 Ireland, 20 min. 👏
• Stone, dir. Jake and Hannah Graf, 2023 UK, 14 minutes 💝
• Trans Alchemy [Alquimia Trans], dir. Félix Endara, 2024 Ecuador/USA, 8 minutes, in Spanish with English subtitles 👏
• Nest, dir. Willem Koller, 2024 New Zealand, 9 minutes 🤢
• Los Siento [I Feel (For) You], dir. Bella Cintra, 2024 Spain, 7 minutes 👏
• man enough, dir. Beru Tessema, 2024 UK, 25 minutes 💝

SFTFF 2024 #3: Music and Animation

“Music and Animation” shorts program
Thursday, November 14, 2024, 9:00 pm Roxie
and streaming online Nov. 18 – 24

• Fool’s Gold, dir. Che Ortiga, 2023 USA, 4½ minutes 👏
• The Little Piratemaid, dir. Luke Beatrice, 2024 USA, 6 minutes 💖
• Ether Or, dir. Zander Constien, 2023 USA, 9 minutes 🙂
• Butch Dyke, dir. Cai Indermaur, 2024 USA, 4½ minutes 🙂
• Your Part, dir. Nyah Edington, 2024 USA, 3 minutes 😀
• Gemini, dir. Jamie Griffiths, 2024 USA, 6½ minutes 🙂
• No More Longing, dir. Connor Lee O’Keefe, 2022 USA, 16 minutes 👏
• Si estuvieras aqui [Wish You Were Here], dir. Isa Moreno, 2024 USA, 5 minutes 😐

SFTFF 2024 #2: Documentaries

 “Documentaries” (shorts program)
Thursday, November 14, 2024, 7:00 pm, Roxie Theater

• Earth to KB, dir. Em Shapiro, 2024 USA, 19 minutes 💖
• Lavender Outlaws, dir. Damon Beirne, 2024 USA, 15 minutes 👏
• My Fierce Aunt Bianca, dir. María José Maldonado & Latavia Alicia Young 💖
• Finding My Voice, dir. Rouven Gueissaz, 2024 Switzerland, 10 minutes 👏
• Alquimia Trans [Trans Alchemy], dir. Félix Endara, 2024 Ecuador/USA, 8 minutes 👏
• Chosen Family, dir. Salgu Wissmath, 2023 USA, 4½ minutes 👏
• Love Don’t Bully, dir. Yoyo Anchondo, 2023 USA, 8 minutes 👏

SFTFF 2024 #1: Locally Brewed

“Locally Brewed” shorts program

Wednesday, November 13, 7:00 pm, Roxie

and streaming online November 18 – 24

• Transiversary, dir. Kamia Gutierrez, 2024 USA, 8 minutes 💖
• Fool’s Gold, dir. Che Ortiga, 2023 USA, 4½ minutes 👏
• En Memoria, dir. Roberto Fatal, 2024 USA, 11 minutes 👏
• Navel Gazer, dir. Shirin Mori, 2024 USA, 18 minutes 👏
• Toward, dir. Sean Dorsey, 2022 USA, 2½ minutes 😀
• No More Longing, dir. Connor Lee O’Keefe, 2022 USA, 16 minutes 👏
• Ghosts Cross State Lines, dir. Shawna Virago, 2024 USA, 4 minutes 😀
• Saturn Risin9, dir. Tiare Ribeaux & Jody Stillwater, 2024 USA, 11 minutes 👏

San Francisco Transgender Film Festival: more reviews to come

The in-person screenings for the SFTFF were last week, November 13 – 16, and the online streaming is available this week, November 18 – 24. I attended the first six screenings, and will be posting my thoughts about those films soon.

Frameline48: That’s a Wrap!

Frameline48 is over, and all the blogging is done, so here are some stats to tuck it all in bed until next time.

I reviewed 52 feature-length programs and 9 programs of shorts (not counting the streaming program that is a compilation of two other shorts programs) with 56 short films. That is a total of 108 films. By my count, I missed 13 feature-length films and 2 shorts programs, missing out on 9 short films. If you only count films that came out in 2023 and 2024, those numbers drop to 9 features and 4 shorts. By those numbers, I saw 85% of the features and 93% of the shorts, so I wasn’t far off when I said I was going to see “as many films as humanly possible — and then some.”

I used the poop emoji (“really bad”) only three times this year, one feature and two shorts, plus three features and 3 shorts that got a thumbs down. (Of course, one of those won a juried award.) I used the sparkle heart emoji (“must see”) 25 times. I think that’s a pretty good ratio.

If you add in the numbers from the Queer Women of Color Film Festival earlier in June, I saw a total of 53 feature-length films and 104 shorts over the course of one month.

And yet… I somehow managed to miss both of the audience favorites, best narrative feature and best documentary feature. I did see all of the films that won juried awards, and all but one of the honorable mentions, although in several cases I didn’t grok what the juries saw in those films. I’m going to see if I can contact the filmmakers or their publicists and get a screener for those audience winners, or maybe I’ll just wait for them to turn up in the theater or streaming.

Frameline48 Cross-Reference: Short Films Reviewed on this Site

This is a list of all the short films from Frameline48 that are reviewed on this website. After the film title is a shorthand for the program or programs in which that short film screened. The symbols are the same ones used in the cross-reference list of feature films.

• AT&S: Across Time & Space: Black Queer Stories
• CMWDN: Come to My Window: Date Night
• LLS: Love Lies Scheming
• CMWLL: Come to My Window + Love Lies (compilation streaming program)
• Cruel: Cruel Summer
• Fun: Fun in Shorts
• Home: Homegrown Shorts
• QPSS: Queer Places, Spaces, & Shorts
• Rise Up: Rise Up: Doc Shorts
• Wild: Wild Combination

Frameline48 Cross-Reference: Feature Films Reviewed on this Site

Here are all the feature-length films from Frameline48 that are reviewed on this website. Not counting duplicate entries, that’s 52 feature films, plus 9 programs of shorts (see next posting).

Symbols: 🌐 World premiere • 🏁 International premiere • 🌎 North American premiere • 🇺🇸 U.S. premiere • 🌊 West Coast premiere • 🌉 Bay Area premiere • 🏳️‍🌈 Queer premiere • 🏆 Frameline award winner • 🏅 Frameline award honorable mention

FL48: Films I Didn’t See

Try as I might, I was not able to see every single film in Frameline48. Here are the feature-length films I missed. Somehow, yet again, I managed to miss the 🏆 Audience Award winners for both best narrative feature and best documentary feature.

Any Other Way: The Jackie Shane Story

Any Other Way: The Jackie Shane Story, dir. Michael Mabbott & Lucah Rosenberg-Lee, 2024 Canada, 99 min. 💖

Any Other Way:
The Jackie Shane Story

Sunday, June 23, 2024, 6:00 PM, Palace of Fine Arts Theatre • West Coast premiere

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Update: Due to a technical mixup, I was not able to see this documentary during the festival, but I’m still going to review it. At the Frameline screening, Any Other Way was presented the Out in the Silence Award, given to “an outstanding film project that highlights brave acts of LGBTQ+ visibility in places where such acts are not common.”

The Judgment (المحاكمة)

The Judgment (المحاكمة) (El Muhakamah), dir. Marwan Mokbel, 2023 Egypt/Lebanon/USA, 111 min., in English with some Arabic with subtitles 👎

Monday, June 24, 2024, 8:30 PM, Vogue Theatre • Bay Area premiere

available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: contains disturbing images

The Judgment (المحاكمة)

Mohamed (or Mo, as he now prefers to be called) has lived in the United States for his entire life, except the year he was 14, when he was sent to live with family in Egypt, an experience he has mostly purged from his conscious memory. A family emergency compels him to fly to Egypt, with his Egyptian boyfriend in tow. His mother needs him to sign some legal papers, but she refuses to see or even speak to him. He becomes convinced that a friend of his mother’s has placed a curse on him, and he goes farther and farther off the deep end, pushing away his lover, trying to break the curse. At the end, there is some resolution, but not nearly enough to redeem the film. It’s a weird, creepy religious horror film, which is not a combination I could ever imagine working well, even with decent acting performances, direction, and production. Not recommended.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • preview • other • Rotten Tomatoes: [not yet scored] •

In the Summers

In the Summers, dir. Alessandra Lacorazza (Samudio), 2024 USA, 98 min., in English with small amounts of Spanish 👏

Thursday, June 20, 2024, 6:00 PM, Palace of Fine Arts Theatre • Bay Area premiere • Queer premiere

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

🏆 Frameline48 Jury Award: honorable mention, Outstanding First Narrative Feature

In the Summers

After a divorce, two sisters live in California with their mother, but spend the summers in Las Cruces, New Mexico, with their father. Over the course of several years, we watch them grow up. The father, Vicente (played by Puerto Rican rapper Residente), is adoring but tempestuous, with too much of a taste for alcohol, a mercurial temper, and a stubborn streak a mile wide. One of the issues that gradually unfolds over the course of several summers is that one of the sisters, Violeta (Lío Mehiel, pictured right — star of last year’s Mutt, which is now available on Netflix), now identifies as trans masculine.

The story is a bit slow, but overall a good story that benefits from taking its time. There were a couple of issues that I hope got fixed in post: the sound on my screener was a bit muddy, and there were no captions or subtitles at all. I know enough Spanish that I could make out most of the dialogue, but si tu no hablas, you would miss some useful details.

Highly recommended.

• IMDb • Official website • preview • Wikipedia • Rotten Tomatoes: 87% • Lio Mehiel

Levante (Power Alley)

Levante (Power Alley) (literally “Uprising”), dir. Lillah Halla, 2023 Brazil/France/Uruguay, 99 min., in Portuguese and Spanish with English subtitles 👍🏐

Tuesday, June 25, 2024, 8:30 PM, New Parkway

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: contains scenes of violence and public harassment, and also scenes of incidental nudity in showers and locker rooms

Levante (Power Alley)

Sofia (Ayomi Domenica, pictured, right) is the star player on her high school volleyball team in São Paulo, which is in the championship round. Sofia is in the running for a major international scholarship, but the selection hinges on that final championship game. There’s just one thing: she’s pregnant by a guy she barely knows, and abortion is illegal in Brazil. Anti-abortion zealots get word of her plans and are determined to stop her at any cost, by trickery, by blackmail, by public ostracism, and by terrorizing her home. With support from her teammates and friends, she finds a way through.

The story is a powerful one of an uprising (the Portuguese title) against unjust and unreasonable laws that deny Sofia the most basic bodily autonomy. Unfortunately, I found it a bit slow moving, even at 1.5X, with rather more scenes of the volleyball games than I needed. Of course, it was also the last film I screened for Frameline48, so my own festival fatigue was definitely a factor. Highly recommended.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram: @Levante_Filme @Lilla_Pwr • Facebook • preview • other • Sao Paulo

Meanwhile

Meanwhile, dir. Catherine Gund, 2024 USA, 89 min. 💖

Sunday, June 23, 2024, 12:00 PM, Vogue Theatre • West Coast premiere, Queer premiere

available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore (within California only)

Meanwhile

Meanwhile is a non-linear exploration of race, gender, sexual orientation, poetry, painting, sculpture, and dance, history and the future, life and death. It is softly contemplative, with music to match that mood.

America in the 21st century is a tangle of contradictions. In many ways, we have made tangible progress in dismantling racism, and yet white supremacy is still very much a visible presence. We ended the legal structure of chattel slavery, but we have done far too little to undo its legacy, often preferring to cover our eyes to shield our hearts from the reality that there is still so much more that needs to be done.

This gentle film is also deeply thought-provoking, very much a MUST SEE, most especially for anyone who would pretend that America has put racism in the rear-view mirror.

• IMDb [director] • Official website • Filmmaker • preview • other •

Throuple

Throuple, dir. Greyson Horst, 2024 USA, 89 min. 🙂

Thursday, June 27, 2024, 3:30 PM, Roxie

(preceded by the short Dream Burger, which is in the “Wild Combination” streaming shorts)

available (separately) in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Throuple

Michael (pictured, left) is an aspiring musician, working by day as an executive assistant. He’s also an annoying self-centered wishy-washy mess. He meets Georgie (center) and Connor (right), a married couple. Michael is much more interested in Georgie than in Connor, setting up a delicate balancing act of throupling up without destroying the couple. Various situations with Georgie and Connor, and with his best friend Tristan and her longtime girlfriend Abby, force Michael out of his bubble to confront who he wants to be and how he wants to relate to others. I won’t give it away, but I thought the ending was abrupt and unsatisfying, as if they wanted to have a couple more scenes but ran out of time. I’m not a big fan of annoying protagonists, but I’ll give this one a “recommended.”

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram: @ThroupleTheMovie • Facebook • preview  • Throuple Live! teaser • other •

We Forgot to Break Up

We Forgot to Break Up, dir. Karen Knox, 2024 Canada, 94 min. 👍

Friday, June 28, 2024, 3:30 PM, Roxie • U.S. premiere

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

We Forgot to Break Up

There was a short called We Forgot to Break Up👏 in Frameline42 (2017), with a related storyline. However, there are significant differences, beginning with the cast and crew. The director, writers, and principal actors are all new. The only commonality I found was one of the producers, Nicole Hilliard-Forde. The other salient difference is that in the 2017 short, “Evie” (Evan before transition) was a member of the band, disappeared for a while, and then reappeared as Evan. In the 2024 feature film, Evan is Evan from the beginning.

Linda Perry: Let it Die Here

Linda Perry: Let it Die Here, dir. Don Hardy, 2024 USA, 93 min. 💖

Friday, June 28, 2024, 6:30 PM, Herbst Theatre • West Coast premiere

with Pride Kickoff Party at Oasis after the film

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Linda Perry: Let it Die Here

Linda Perry bares her soul in this documentary, letting us in to her childhood with abusive parents, the 4 Non Blondes era, personal and artistic relationships, as Linda went from singer-songwriter to producer and back to singer-songwriter AND producer. We get to meet some of the amazing artists she’s worked with (Dolly Parton, Christina Aguilera, Brandi Carlile, and more), and her ex-wife Sara Gilbert. We get to see the creative process from the first spark to the group collaboration to the final recording, but we also hear about the good, the bad, and the ugly in her life. Linda Perry’s music carries a vibrant emotional authenticity, and this excellent portrait will give you insight into what drives that. Definitely a MUST SEE.

LInda Perry: Let it Die Here had its world premiere at Tribeca earlier this month.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • InstagramL @RealLindaPerry • Facebook • preview • other •

Can’t Stop Change: Queer Climate Stories from the Florida Frontlines

Can’t Stop Change: Queer Climate Stories from the Florida Frontlines (No se para el cambio: Historias climáticas queer desde la primera línea de Florida), dir. Vanessa Raditz, Natalia Villarán-Quiñones, and Yarrow Koning, 2024 USA, in English and Spanish with open captions in both languages throughout, 97 min. 💖

Monday, June 24, 2024, 6:00 PM, New Parkway Theatre

available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Can’t Stop Change:
Queer Climate Stories

Florida is at the epicenter of the right-wing project to reshape America. Florida and Wisconsin are the testbeds for legislation put forward by ALEC, and in his laughable pursuit of the Presidential nomination, Governor Ron DeSantis went after LGBTQ+ (especially trans people and anyone standing in the way of Development, specifically including drill, baby, drill. In the face of that onslaught, some activists are holding their ground and trying to raise awareness and hopefully at some point turn the tide. Filmmakers Vanessa Raditz, Natalia Villarán-Quiñones, and Yarrow Koning interviewed activists in North Florida, Central Florida, and South Florida, plus some who felt they had to leave Florida for their own safety. They talked particularly about the intersection of climate change activism with communities marginalized by the white heteropatriarchy.

The result is a call to action and a beacon of hope, and draws clear connections between issues we often think of separately. For example, climate change has brought devastation to many parts of Florida in the form of stronger hurricanes, but the burden of that devastation has fallen disproportionately on Black and brown people, poor people, immigrants, and other people just trying to hang on. Climate is a “threat multiplier,” magnifying existing injustices. It’s a necessary film, and one that everyone should watch, definitely a MUST SEE, but unfortunately, the people who most need to see it will tune out pretty early on when they hear the radicals talk. They’re not exactly fiddling while Rome burns, but they’re playing 🙈🙉🙊 even as experts predict that as much as 60% of the land area of the city of Miami could be underwater by 2060.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • preview • other • Historias climaticas queer desde la primera linea de Florida Natalian Villaran-Quinones

Second Nature

Second Nature, dir. Drew Denny, 2024 USA/Netherlands, 53 min. 💖🦁🐒🦆🐠

Sunday, June 23, 2024, 4:30 PM, Vogue Theatre (special sneak preview screening)

available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Second Nature

As a child, I was taught that nature and natural selection prescribe certain gender roles and behaviors. Females are smaller, less aggressive, more selective in mating, and more nurturing with their offspring. Males are larger, more aggressive, more likely to be promiscuous, and less likely to be involved in caring for their young. That turns out to be a view shaped by projecting 19th-century human norms onto animals, who often show much greater complexity. First, there are numerous species in which an individual can change its sex, and in some cases change and change back. Every mammal species and many other animals have been found to engage in homosexual behavior, both males and females. And bonobos, one of our closest genetic relatives, live in largely peaceful groups in a matriarchal structure in which the females are dominant in almost every respect. Disputes are generally settled by having sex, and the physical violence that does occur is often female-on-male.

The bottom line, as this wonderful documentary illustrates with copious examples, is that humans are the only primate species with taboos against homosexual behavior and gender nonconformity. It is not homosexuality that is abnormal, it is homophobia that is abnormal. Along the way, filmmaker Drew Denny interviews multiple BIPOC wildlife experts, because the “traditional” way of looking at animal gender and sexuality is deeply rooted in white cis-male patriarchy. The reality is that diversity is an evolutionary benefit, and rigid conformity is an evolutionary risk. Second Nature is a joy to watch, and definitely a MUST SEE, especially if you want to answer back people who insist that there are only two sexes and that biological sex determines gender.

• IMDb [director] • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram: @SecondNatureDoc • Facebook • preview • other •

Best Years

Best Years (episodes 1 through 6), dir. Jordan Hidalgo, 2024 USA, 50 min. total 👍

Saturday, June 22, 2024, 1:00 PM, Vogue Theatre • World premiere

(screened with ILY, BYE, which also screens in “Fun in Shorts (2024)”)

also available (separately) in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Best Years

Troy (Josh Bonzie, pictured) recently moved to Brooklyn with his friend Pat and his then-boyfriend Chance, but Troy and Chance broke up, and haven’t yet post-processed the breakup to see if they might reconcile. Troy is working as a busboy/‌dishwasher and otherwise moping about the house listening to Enya and making Mickey Mouse pancakes in his underwear. Pat is trying to get a job with the mayor’s re-election campaign. Billie, another tenant in the building who sometimes acts as a proxy for the landlord, buttonholes Troy into helping two new tenants move in, one of whom, Abel, catches Troy’s fancy (shown here is the moment Troy meets Abel). Troy and Abel begin getting to know one another, complicating the “will they or won’t they” reunion with Chance.

Some of the characters, especially the neighbor Billie, are basically non-stop irritating, only rarely to comedic effect. I just don’t find seeing irritating people bickering to be very funny. Also, the first two episodes mostly establish Troy, Pat, Chance, and Billie; they did little to hook the audience, and we don’t even see Abel until episode 3. The series improves from that point forward, with less obnoxo-bickering and more actual characterization. It’s worth sitting through the first two episodes (although I wouldn’t begrude you a bit of fast-forwarding) to get to the better material later in the series. Highly recommended.

• IMDb [director] • TMDB • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram:@Jordan23_Films • Facebook • preview • other •

Haze

Haze, dir. Matthew Fifer, 2024 USA, 76 min. ❓

Friday, June 28, 2024, 8:30 PM Roxie

theater screening preceded by the short RAT! (also in the “Cruel Summer” streaming program)

Haze is not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: contains themes of abuse and homophobic violence

Haze

Frameline description: “This new feature from director Matthew Fifer (co-director of Cicada, Frameline44) immerses the viewer with a lush, atmospheric, and darkly sexy portrait of a man’s quest for answers to his troubled past. Cole Doman (Mutt, Frameline47, also seen at Frameline48 in the short film Bust) stars as Joe, a gay, investigative journalist who returns to his hometown after recently becoming sober. Struggling to find steady work, Joe becomes laser focused on the next big story to relaunch his career: the mysterious death of eight gay men that occurred at the town’s psychiatric hospital. Now abandoned and intentionally forgotten by the town's people, the looming structure haunts Joe in his quest for the truth.

“When some of these locals begin dropping dead of seemingly-natural causes, we follow Joe and the new, sweltering townie man in his life, Luke (Sense8’s Brian J. Smith, who also directed A House Is Not a Disco in the Frameline48 program), through a complex web of unanswered questions that all seem to share a common explanation — but what? Is this somehow related to his sister’s tragic death when they were children?”

My thoughts: I don’t really have much to say about this film, because I walked out pretty early on. To be fair, that was mostly because I wasn’t feeling great and just wanted to go home to bed, but I will say that it did not seem to be heading towards a satisfying viewing experience to my tastes. The words “darkly sexy thriller” mostly make my eyes roll back in my head, so my bottom line is “not for me.”

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Instagram: @MattLangeFifer • preview • other •

Una película barata

Una película barata, dir. Osama Chami, 2024 Spain, 62 min., in Spanish with English subtitles 👍

Friday, June 28, 2024, 6:00 PM, Roxie • World premiere

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: contains discussions of abuse

Una película barata

Fede, a gay man about 30 years old, is having an existential crisis. He recently broke up with his boyfriend and took a leave of absence from his job to figure out where he’s going next. While reading in the park one afternoon, he encounters Iván (Jorge Motos), someone he knew several years ago, when Fede was about 20 and Iván was a pre-teen. Their chance encounter launches both men on a wild summer of unpredictable plot twists, which they repeatedly reference as if they were writing the script for a movie. (Is 2024 The Year of Meta, or what?). Iván’s contributions are sometimes creepy and disturbing, which I found detracted somewhat from the comedy. However, it definitely wasn’t formulaic, and the quick pace of the story brings the film in at barely over an hour.

Highly recommended, with a caveat that Iván’s oddball character is definitely not for everyone.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • preview • other • Una pelicula barata Ivan

Si je meurs, ce sera de joie (If I Die, It’ll be of Joy)

Si je meurs, ce sera de joie (If I Die, It’ll be of Joy), dir. Alexis Taillant, 2024 France, 80 min., in French with English subtitles 💖

Friday, June 28, 2024, 1:00 PM, Roxie Theater • World premiere

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Si je meurs, ce sera de joie
If I Die, It’ll be of Joy

Filmmaker Alexis Taillant interviewed several LGBTQ+ elders, all of them over 65, about their invisibility in society, and their commodification as part of the for-profit nursing home industry, medicalizing the care of older people, simply for lack of better options. The nursing homes are chronically understaffed, and most people are put in semi-private rooms, sharing with someone, usually not a relative or close friend. Our culture tends to put old people in a box with little room for sexuality, personality, or creativity. That raises some questions that most people don’t think about and certainly don’t talk about, like Where do you go when you want to masturbate?

I grew up seeing very little representation of sexual desire by women or by older people, other than the caricatures of “bimbos” and “dirty old men” played for ridicule on TV, so seeing lesbians in their 70s and 80s talking about their undiminished sex drive is a refreshing shift of context. Some older people have begun organizing under the banner of Grey Pride to advocate for themselves, for others no longer able to speak out, and for those to come who may never give a thought to their own old age. It’s a beautiful exploration of a neglected topic, definitely a MUST SEE for anyone who is old and for anyone who hopes someday to reach old age.

• IMDb • Official website [Mubi] [Cinando/Outplay] • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • preview • other •

13 Sentimentos (Perfect Endings)

13 Sentimentos (Perfect Endings), dir. Daniel Ribeiro, 2024 Brazil, 100 min., in Portuguese with English subtitles 💖

Thursday, June 27, 2024, 8:30 PM, Vogue Theatre • International premiere

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: contains semi-explicit simulated sex scenes

13 Sentimentos (Perfect Endings)

In 2010, Daniel Ribeiro brought his wonderful short film Eu não quero voltar sozinho (I Don’t Want to Go Back Alone) [YouTube] to Frameline 34, where it was met with thunderous applause. Four years later, he returned with the feature-length version of the same basic story, Hoje eu quero voltar sozinho (literally Today I Want to Go Back Alone, but titled in English as The Way He Looks) [Netflix], which won the audience award for best feature at Frameline38. By amusing coincidence, if Leonardo and Gabriel were in high school in 2010, they would now be very close to the age of the main characters in this year’s film.

However, the characters and the story in 13 Sentimentos (Perfect Endings) are quite different. João (Artur Volpi, pictured foreground) is a struggling filmmaker who just ended a 10-year relationship. He’s trying to find work, he’s trying to finish a screenplay, he’s trying to find a hookup, and ultimately he’s trying to find love. The line between the screenplay he’s writing and his actual experiences begins to blur as he encounters ups and downs in all areas of his life. It’s a rom-com, and funny throughout, including some of the sexy scenes, but there are also some serious moments of genuine emotion and connection. Enthusiastically recommended, MUST SEE.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • preview • other • Joao Eu nao quero voltar sozinho

Crossing

Crossing, dir. Levan Akin, 2024 Sweden/Denmark/France/Turkey/Georgia, 105 min., in Georgian and Turkish with English subtitles, and in English without subtitles 👍

Thursday, June 27, 2024, 6:00 PM, Roxie

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Crossing

Lia, a retired schoolteacher in Batumi, Georgia 🇬🇪, is trying to find her niece Tekla after the death of her sister (Tekla’s mother). She has heard that Tekla, who is a trans woman, may have moved to İstanbul. Lia gets help from a neighbor, Achi, a young man who is living with his abusive older brother. They drive together the short distance to the Turkish border, take the long bus ride to Istanbul, and set out trying to find Tekla. Their paths repeatedly cross with an assortment of other characters, including a couple of street kids and a trans woman named Evrim who is studying to be a lawyer and working as an advocate for trans people and other marginalized people in the community, including the street kids.

The film starts off rather slowly, taking a fairly long time to get to the actual searching in Istanbul, and the interweaving of subplots occasionally leaves you wondering how they connect to the main story. Also, the film is slow to warm to both Lia and Achi as sympathetic characters. However, if you start this film, you should stay to the end, because most of the payoff comes in the last 10 to 15 minutes. Highly recommended.

• IMDb • Official website [Mubi] • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • preview • Wikipedia • Rotten Tomatoes: 92% •

A House is Not a Disco

A House is Not a Disco, dir. Brian J. Smith, 2024 USA, 91 min. 👍

Saturday, June 29, 2024, 6:30 PM, Herbst Theatre

plus Digital Screening Room streaming encore (within California only)

A House is Not a Disco

Filmmaker Brian J. Smith is best known on camera for Sense8 and The Matrix Resurrections, but also appears in Frameline48’s Haze (Friday, June 28, 8:30 PM, Roxie, review to follow). A House is Not a Disco chronicles a year (on- and off-season) of Fire Island Pines, New York, a gay beach enclave just 50 miles from New York City. We meet year-round residents and summer partiers, political activists working to make The Pines more inclusive, including people who’ve been coming since the 1970s and people there for the first time. Fire Island (which also includes the neighboring Cherry Grove, separated by a wilderness area known as The Meatrack for its former reputation as a late-night cruising area) was devastated by HIV/AIDS, with a heavy death toll and an emotional toll on those who survived. Now the challenge Fire Island faces an even deeper existential challenge: climate change has accelerated the erosion of the barrier islands just south of Long Island, and threatens to inundate them completely by around mid-century. Fire Island’s reputation as a haven mostly for affluent white cis gay men also plays heavily into the history, as a new generation struggles to change that reputation. A new park in The Pines honoring Martha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera is a strong step towards inclusiveness.

The story woven together is interesting, especially for anyone with a connection to Fire Island, but I just didn’t really find it compelling enough to warrant a “must see” rating. Still highly recommended, though.

• IMDb • Official website • Instagram: @AHouseIsNotADisco • inside look video • Rotten Tomatoes: 100% •

Desire Lines

Desire Lines, dir. Jules Rosskam, 2024 USA, 81 min. 💖

Saturday, June 22, 2024, 6:00 PM, New Parkway Theatre

plus Digital Screening Room streaming encore (within California only)

⚠️Content advisory: contains nudity and discussions of sexuality, but no explicit depictions.

Desire Lines

There are transgender men (in outdated terms, “female-to-male”) who sexually desire cisgender gay men. Among the first people ever to talk about this issue, at least from a first-person perspective, was Lou Sullivan, who was very public about being trans, about being into gay men, and ultimately about having HIV/AIDS (something he viewed as an ironic counterpoint to all the gender clinics and others who told him that he couldn’t possibly function as a gay man).

Lady Like

Lady Like, dir. Luke Willis, 2024 USA/UK, 88 min. 💖

Wednesday, June 26, 2024, 8:30 PM, Vogue Theatre

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: flashing images

Lady Camden will also be doing a live solo performance at the Palace of Fine Arts on Thursday, June 27, 2024, at 8:00 PM (not part of Frameline48)

Lady Like

Local San Francisco drag queen Lady Camden was a contestant on Season 14 of Ru Paul’s Drag Race. A friend who is a documentary filmmaker followed her along the way. That chronologue is greatly augmented by considerable backstory on Lady Camden’s personal journey to becoming a drag queen, from childhood bullying in Camden, London, to dancing for the Royal Ballet, to landing in San Francisco. 

In an interview, Lady Camden described this film as a love letter to her boyhood self, Rex, represented by a young actor reenacting various moments of childhood and then getting a glimpse of what he would one day become. The device adds a sweetness to the story and a depth beyond “behind the scenes” at RPDR. It’s a compelling portrait, well told and well edited to keep the audience’s attention throughout. Definitely a MUST SEE.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • YouTube channel • preview • SF Dance Film Fest • Smuin Ballet •

Fallen Fruit

Fallen Fruit, dir. Chris Molina, 2024 USA, 86 min. 👏

Wednesday, June 26, 2024, 6:00 PM, Vogue Theatre

screens in person with the short Like You

plus Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Fallen Fruit

Alex (Ramiro Batista, pictured) is a 23-year-old who was dumped by his boyfriend, and thus forced to move back from New York City to his parents’ home in Miami. Alex is at a point in his life where it feels like nothing can go right. His only friend in Miami is about to move across the country. His job prospects are not good. He’s clearly in a depression, although it’s a rational response to the circumstances. Although the character verges at times on being a sad sack, painfully ill-equipped to handle the realities of adulting, he manages to find some moments of joy, so the film doesn’t feel nearly as heavy as Alex’s mood. He’s being pushed into adulthood, ready or not. Highly recommended.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Instagram: @FallenFruitMovie @ChriisMolina [note double i] • preview • other •

Riley

Riley, dir. Benjamin Howard, 2023 USA, 93 min. 👍

Thursday, June 27, 2024, 6:00 PM, Vogue Theatre

also screens in person with MASC4MASC 👏

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: contains scenes suggesting sexual activity just out of frame (nothing explicit or graphic)

Riley

Dakota Riley (Jake Holley) is a high-school football star, already eyeing playing college football next year. His father, a pro football player whose career was ended by an injury, is the head coach at the high school, and clearly expects his son to pick up his legacy, leaving little space to talk about anything else in Dakota’s life. His mother is a devout Christian, so he doesn’t want to risk talking to her about something that doesn’t fit in with God’s plan for his life. He begins dating his best friend (a girl), but he finds it more and more difficult to deny that he has … other feelings. The fact that he has two friends in school who are openly queer doesn’t quell the turmoil.

As I’ve said in this blog before, I’m not much of a fan of sportsball, especially high school foo-ball 🏈. However, the scenes of actual foo-ball are mostly incidental to the story, which is more about Riley’s rough road to understanding and accepting what he wants in life. Holley is a little old to be playing high school, but he makes up for that by showing in Dakota’s face the tangle of emotions broiling beneath the surface. It’s well done, definitely a MUST SEE if you like football, highly recommended for anyone else.

Jaeden, one of the supporting characters, is played by Colin McCalla, who was in The Dick Appointment (Fun in Boys Shorts 2020, Frameline44), available on YouTube to Dekkoo subscribers. Unfortunately, the pandemic threw off my rhythm that year, so I didn’t post any reviews. Amusing side note: Riley’s girlfriend Skylar is played by Riley Quinn Scott, so there are Rileys all over the place.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Instagram / Facebook: @WindsorFilmCo • preview • Wikipedia • Rotten Tomatoes: [not yet scored] •

Los amantes astronautas (The Astronaut Lovers)

Los amantes astronautas (The Astronaut Lovers), dir. Marco Berger, 2024 Argentina/Spain, 116 min., in Spanish with English subtitles 💖

Tuesday, June 25, 2024, 8:30 PM, Vogue Theatre

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Los amantes astronautas
(The Astronaut Lovers)

A group of friends gather in a beach house near Buenos Aires for a vacation. Most of them are from the area, but Pedro (Javier Orán, right) is returning from Spain; he lived in Buenos Aires as a teenager. His cousin has also invited Maxi (Lautaro Bettoni, left), who went to summer camp with Pedro back in the day. Pedro and Maxi begin an escalating sequence of flirtations, including Maxi’s attempt to make his ex-girlfriend jealous by pretending that Pedro is his boyfriend. The flirtation is always veiled behind a veil of jokes, but we begin to wonder how serious it is for one or the other of the players.

On the surface, Los amantes astronautas is a light comedy about a group of friends vacationing at the beach. On that level, it was a rousing success, with plenty of chuckles and quite a few laughs. The writing is sharp and witty, the performances excellent, and the editing spot-on. However, what makes this film special is the scenes that aren’t played for laughs, with characters honestly expressing real feelings, able to articulate their emotions. It’s a joy to watch — and especially a palate cleanser from the dreadful Los demonios del amanecer (Demons at Dawn), in that Astronautas has a plot and character development and, most shockingly, an ending.

I enjoyed the three Berger films I’ve seen previously: Plan B (2010, Frameline34), Ausente (Absent) (2011, Frameline35), and Mariposa (Butterfly) (2015, Frameline39), although the last one definitely suffered a bit of “lost in translation,” not least the fact that mariposa is a gentle slang term for gay men. Astronautas hits all the right notes, a feel-good comedy with some real emotions underneath, definitely a MUST SEE.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram: @MarcoBergerCine • Facebook • preview • other • Javier Oran

Asog

Asog, dir. Seán Devlin (叶世民), 2023 Canada/Philippines/USA, 101 min., in Tagalog and Waray with English subtitles, small portions in English without subtitles👍

Tuesday, June 25, 2024, 3:30 PM, Roxie

Asog

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

First of all, the title refers to a traditional Filipino healer. The women healers were called Babaylan, but there were also men who looked like women, who wore long clothes and long hair, called Asog. This film is a “docu-fiction,” with substantial amounts of documentary footage, and also several of the actors, including the two protagonists, playing themselves. However, some of the other characters and some of the situations are amalgams or simply fictional.

Doppelgängers³ (Doppelgangers3)

Doppelgängers³, dir. Nelly Ben Hayoun-Stépanian, 2024 UK/USA, 73 min., in English, Armenian, and French, fully subtitled in English 👍

Monday, June 24, 2024, 8:30 PM, New Parkway

Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Doppelgängers³

Dr. Nelly Ben Hayoun-Stépanian has worked in fields as diverse as SETI research, architecture, and textile design. Her personal heritage is a mix of French Algerian and Armenian. In this documentary, she explores some questions that arise when we think about colonizing the moon and beyond. How can a small colony, perhaps a dozen or at most a few hundred people, represent the diversity of human experience, in terms of race and language, but also in terms of gender identity, sexual orientation, and political outlook? What psychological, sociological, cultural, economic, ecological, and philosophical issues need to be studied? She interviews everyone from ubiquitous theoretical physicist Michio Kaku to a trans rights activist in Armenia.

There’s quite a lot of interesting material, but it felt a bit scattershot, jumping about without a cohesive focus. It was thought-provoking, but I couldn’t help feeling it could have been more. Recommended.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • preview • other • Nelly Ben Hayoun-Stepanian Doppelgangers3 Schrodinger’s Cat

Good One

Good One, dir. India Donaldson, 2024 USA, 89 min. 😑

Monday, June 24, 2024, 8:30 PM, Roxie

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: contains themes of abuse

Good One

Sam and her father Chris go on a hiking/camping trip to bond. It was supposed to be a foursome, with Chris’s best friend Matt and Matt’s son Dylan, but Dylan bailed for reasons having something to do with his parents’ recent divorce, so Sam is stuck with two little boys with dad bods telling dad jokes. The scenery they’re hiking through is beautiful, but that’s about all this film has going for it. Matt is a mess and Chris is in a little world of his own, leaving Sam to be the adult. The only LGBTQ+ content is a few brief texts and video calls with Sam’s new girlfriend Jessie. In all, there was just far too little story for a feature-length film, with another group of campers thrown in for no apparent reason, and some vague hints of past problems between some of our trio, surfacing in an unpleasant interaction that they struggle to deal with appropriately. I was underwhelmed. Neutral recommendation. Of course, the critics are raving about it, and it has won several awards, and is coming out in theaters in August.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Rotten Tomatoes: 94% • preview • Wikipedia •

Frammenti di un percorso amoroso (Fragments of a Life Loved)

Frammenti di un percorso amoroso (Fragments of a Life Loved), dir. Chloé Barreau, 2023 Italy, 96 min., in French and Italian with English subtitles 🥱

Monday, June 24, 2024, 6:00 PM, Roxie

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

🏆 Frameline48 Jury Award: Outstanding Documentary Feature

Frammenti / Fragments

The Frameline description says, “Imagine walking into a room filled with all your former lovers, and they’re talking about you. Now imagine they’re all there because you invited them.” There are just two things: (1) the former lovers are not in the same room for the great majority of the film, they’re interviewed individually, and (2) Chloé was not present for most of the interviews.

Chloe Barreau obsessively video recorded her entire life, starting in her teens, including footage of every single person she had a romantic or sexual relationship with, back to age 16. She also hoarded photos and love letters. She mixes that archive material with present-day interviews with the ex-lovers, laying bare just about every facet of their interactions. It felt self-indulgent, maybe a bit exhibitionistic, like something that might have held my interest if I knew any of the people involved, but, as it was, it was occasionally interesting but never compelling. Chloé certainly has a colorful romantic past, which she puts on display, warts and all, but I really didn’t get any bigger picture, just “here are all my exes talking about how we got together and why we broke up.” If the description sounds interesting, check out the preview (link below), but if the description has you saying “meh,” you should probably skip it. Neutral recommendation.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • preview • watch online •

Update: Shorts Programs

The newly reviewed shorts are (by program):

• Fun in Shorts: “ILY, BYE” and “Stories from My Gay Grandparents, episode 1”
• Homegrown Shorts: “After All” and “Saturn Risin9”✼
• Across Time & Space: Queer Black Stories: “Saturn Risin9”✼
• Queer Places, Spaces, & Shorts: “Trans Heaven, Pennsylvania”
• Rise Up: Doc Shorts: “Seat 31: Zooey Zephyr”
• Wild Combination: “MASC4MASC”✼

✼ The short “Saturn Risin9” is part of both the “Homegrown Shorts” and the “Across Time & Space: Queer Black Stories” programs.
✻ The short “MASC4MASC” also screens in-person before the feature film Riley.

Los demonios de amanecer (Demons at Dawn)

Los demonios de amanecer (Demons at Dawn), dir. Julián Hernández, 2024 Mexico, 136 min., in Spanish with English subtitles 💩

Sunday, June 23, 2024, Roxie U.S. premiere

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: contains multiple graphic depictions of simulated sex

Los demonios de amanecer
(Demons at Dawn)
Luís Vegas & Axel Shuarma

We’re in Mexico City. Orlando (Luís Vegas) is a dance student, hoping to become a professional dancer and/or singer, but working as a go-go boy in a gay club while also living with his parents and sharing a bedroom with his brother. Marco (Axel Shuarma) is a nursing student who has just gotten his first apartment as he gets close to graduation. The two begin a hot and steamy affair. Then some things happen that derail their fairytale romance — the metaphorical “demons at dawn” — but I couldn’t give you spoilers if I wanted to, because the film never really lets us know what happened, let alone why. Orlando especially is unable to articulate what is happening, leading to a repetitive series of exchanges of “¿Qué pasó? No sé. ¿Qué pasó? No sé. ¿Qué pasó? No sé. ¿Qué pasó? No sé. ¿Qué pasó? No sé.” (“What happened? I don’t know.”) Marco is almost as inexpressive. At the end, there is a (dream?) sequence that suddenly cuts off the loose threads (I can’t really say they are in any sense tied together), but in a resoundingly unsatisfying way.

National Anthem

National Anthem, dir. Luke Gilford, 2023 USA, 99 min. 💖

Sunday, June 23, 2024, 6:00 PM, Roxie

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

⚠️Content advisory: rated R for sexual content, graphic nudity, language, and some drug use

🏆 Frameline48 Jury Award: Outstanding First Narrative Feature

National Anthem

21-year-old Dylan (Charlie Plummer) still lives at home in rural New Mexico with his mother (remarkably irresponsible even when she’s not drinking) and his pre-teen younger brother Cassidy (because somebody has to take care of the kid). Dylan works odd jobs as a day laborer, until one day Pepe shows up, looking for people to do some work on his ranch, The House of Splendor. It gradually becomes clear that House of Splendor is not your average ranch, with people of various gender identities living together as a chosen family, occasionally going off to a queer rodeo. For the first time in his life, Dylan feels like he can be himself and explore parts of himself he had never acknowledged.

It’s a subtle film, insinuating itself and its message into you without the need for clumsy clue-by-fours. It affirms the beauty of being yourself with people who accept you as-is, with some laughs and some sexy time to bridge the serious moments that tug at your heartstrings. It also actively reclaims the United States flag as a symbol for everyone, not just the far right. In particular, it affirms that you can do that even in a place like rural New Mexico. Definitely a MUST SEE.

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook • preview • Wikipedia • Rotten Tomatoes: 95% • in theaters Friday, July 12, 2024 • the book National Anthem by Luke Gilford •

Sebastian

Sebastian, dir. Mikko Mäkelä, 2024 UK/Finland/Belgium, 110 min. 👏

Monday, June 24, 6:00 PM, Vogue Theatre

not available in the Digital Screening Room streaming encore

Sebastian

Max is an up-and-coming writer, freelancing for a literary magazine and working on his first novel. He lists himself on an app for escorts and begins taking clients under the name Sebastian, and then writing Sebastian’s experiences for the novel. As Max goes deeper into Sebastian’s world, which eventually, inevitably collides with Max’s world, his writing draws the attention of a publishing house interested in the novel, but he also finds the line between himself and his alter ego beginning to get a bit fuzzy. He also discovers aspects of sex work that he had never anticipated. Max/Sebastian is never shown in a sensationalist light, but a tender portrayal imbued with compassion and nuance. Highly recommended.

Previous Frameline entry: A Moment in the Reeds (Tämä Hetki Kaislikossa) (2018, Frameline42)

• IMDb • Official website • Filmmaker • Rotten Tomatoes: 78% • preview • Wikipedia • Mikko Makela

note: there is also a Finnish former professional ice hockey player named Mikko Mäkelä