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Frameline Outline by Tom Mayer
We are proud to present the best and most diverse Frameline in years,’’ notes fest helmer Jennifer Morris about Frameline34 – the San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival. Tens of thousands of people from the Bay Area and far beyond will attend LGBT films from more than 20 countries, including Brazil, China, Norway, Tunisia, and the Bahamas, see http://www.frameline.org. It runs from June 17 to 27, at the Castro, Roxie, and Victoria Theatre in San Francisco.
The festival opens at the Castro with “The Secret Diaries of Anne Lister” by James Kent, a passionate telling of the true story of a British lesbian who defied Victorian conventions to live with a female lover in the 1800s. The film is based on Lister’s diaries – written in code and recently deciphered – and gives an amazing look into 19th century lesbian life.
The festival closes on June 27 with “Howl,” about the early years of poet Allen Ginsberg. San Francisco residents and Academy Award-winning filmmakers Rob Epstein (“The Times of Harvey Milk”) and Jeffrey Friedman (“The Celluloid Closet”) combine genres to portray the dawn of a literary revolution. The stellar cast includes James Franco as a handsome young Allen Ginsberg, David Strathairn as the prosecutor, and Jon Hamm (“Mad Men”).
Frameline will be the US premiere of the multi-nation feature film “Contracorriente” (“Undertow”), in which a married Peruvian fisherman tries to reconcile his attraction to his male lover and village rejection, at the Castro, June 22. The stunning doc “We Were Here: Voices From the AIDS Years” in San Francisco, directed by David Weissman, screens there on June 20.
“Beautiful Darling: The Life and Times of Candy Darling,” about the famous and fabulous Andy Warhol superstar, is there on the June 23, complimenting the Warhol retrospective. Curated by Yale University professor Ronald Gregg, this series explores Warhol’s early film style, queer subject matter, and influence on both experimental and mainstream gay cinema. The series includes his “Haircut #1,” “Blow Job,” “Vinyl,” and “My Hustler.”
“Frameline has been exploring the underground LGBT film movement over last year and this year,” Frameline director K. C. Price said, when asked how the Warhol program came about. “Last year, we presented the annual Frameline Award to local underground filmmakers George and Mike Kuchar, who were featured in Jennifer Kroot’s doc ‘It Came From Kuchar.’ We also programmed a series of queer shorts from Canyon Cinema that featured a wide variety of underground filmmakers. This year, we wanted to highlight Warhol’s influence on underground queer cinema. And we have a excellent documentary about Burroughs.”
This year the Frameline Award will be presented to Wolfe Video’s Kathy Wolfe and Maria Lynn for their pioneering distribution of queer film over the last 25 years (see article p1).They will also focus on queer Latin American films. Argentinian Marco Berger’s “Plan B” offers a sexy look at two men caught in a love triangle. After his girlfriend breaks up with him, Bruno decides he’ll do anything to get her back – even pretend to have a crush on her new bisexual boyfriend. Marcelo Laffitte’s “Elvis & Madona,” from Brazil, offers another unconventional love story, this time between “Elvis,” a beautiful young lesbian who delivers pizzas, and “Madona,” a transgender hairdresser and performer.
Several films that premiered at Cannes will screen, including “Spring Fever,” winner of a Cannes Best Screenplay, about the queer trysts of five young people in China. Director Lou Ye, who was banned from filmmaking for five years for not submitting his last film (“Summer Palace”) to the censors, shot “Spring Fever” in defiance of this ban. Also a Cannes favorite, Xavier Dolan’s “I Killed My Mother” delivers a non-traditional, gay coming-of-age story, about a teenager’s love/hate relationship with his mom.
Over the years, Frameline has been known for presenting major documentaries, and this year is no exception. From Australia, Leanne Pooley’s “The Topp Twins: Untouchable Girls” covers a pair of yodeling twin lesbians, famous throughout New Zealand for their comedy and country music. The recipient of a Frameline Completion Fund grant, Yony Leyser’s “William S. Burroughs: A Man Within” is a docthat follows the life and times of the literary outlaw and queer who godfathered the Beats.
Frameline will also US premiere “The Owls,” an experimental narrative by the iconic Cheryl Dunye (“The Watermelon Woman”) about four aging lesbians who accidentally kill a young lesbian and try to get away with it. Dunye fuses noir and documentary, revisiting and challenging the “pathological lesbian” films of the ‘60s, while also asking about the relevance of age and race today. “Le Refuge,” the latest from François Ozon, is the story of a pregnant woman who loses her lover to a drug overdose.
There will also be programs of shorts, including the recent Oscar winner “The New Tenants,” by J. Back and D. Rakoff (“This American Life”). And the ever popular “Fun in Girls Shorts and Fun in Boys Shorts” will be back, featuring queer short from around the world.Posted on Jun 04, 2010 - 10:36 PM