Doc Corner: Tribeca '21 — 'Socks on Fire' and 'North by Current' explore queerness in rural America

By Glenn Dunks

It’s thankfully no longer all that rare to see stories of queer people in rural settings. Especially in documentary. But that doesn’t make it any less special to see their stories—once so often relegated to traumatic narratives centering violence—told by queer filmmakers. Two films in particular at the recently wrapped Tribeca Film Festival examined the changing dynamics of (some) American small-town life. Both take elements of memoir and even non-traditional storytelling to create unique films that make strong arguments for the sheer human decency that many in minority communities desire.

While Bo McGuire’s Socks on Fire and Angelo Madsen Minax’s North by Current tell stories that confront the still very tangible realities of being LGBTQ+ outside of the more accepting big cities, they do so with artistic flair and the confidence that comes from generational change...

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Tribeca 2021: "Lorelei" review

by Jason Adams

It's always a thrill to see fantastically talented supporting actors who don't always get the leading roles they deserve actually get the leading roles they deserve. Director Sabrina Doyle's post-prison drama called Lorelei, which just debuted at Tribeca, gives us a two-fer on that front. It stars Pablo Schreiber (of Orange is the New Black and American Gods) and Jena Malone (of Donnie Darko and The Hunger Games and I could just keep going -- she's a long-time personal fave) as, respectively, the ex-convict looking to set his life straight and the girl he left behind. Lorelei starts out kinda obvious but ultimately ends up swerving, thanks to the sheer willpower of its leads and an openness by its filmmaker to follow an idiosyncratic path alongside them. It veers into far more interesting territory than you might first guess. 

Schreiber and Malone each have enormous screen presence, if not necessarily in the same ways...

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Doc Corner: The art of restoration at TCM Classic Film Festival

By Glenn Dunks

Do you ever think about what career path you may have chosen in retrospect? You know, the one you would have selected had you been able to make such a life-changing decision after having actually experienced life? Maybe you already have your dream job, but even then—there’s often a niggling part of us that imagines something else. If I could turn back time, I think I would love to have gotten into film restoration and archiving. They are each fascinating professions that play to my niche interests including preservation and exhibition of celluloid, not to mention pretty, curated shelves. (I was the guy who would visit the video store and ensure the cases were in alphabetical order.) What's this go to do with anything though?

I bring this up because playing at this month’s TCM Classic Film Festival (May 6–9) is a new documentary called The Méliès’ Mystery about the efforts to conserve and restore the 520 films by the French pioneer, Georges Méliès. Yes, he of A Trip to the Moon had burned the original print negatives of all his movies as his career faltered at the start of the 1910s. His fairy tale excursions of light and magic were out of vogue and his production house of Star Films, with French and American studios, shut up shop.

Méliès’ story is not new to audiences, of course...

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SXSW: Hysterical, Potato Dreams of America, Introducing Selma Blair, and Broadcast Signal Intrusion

by Christopher James

There’s a lot that the pandemic has made harder. The one thing it has made easier has been attending film festivals from all around the country. Pre-pandemic, covering SXSW would’ve required a flight to Austin, Texas, inflated lodging costs and lots of pre-planning. Now, the only lines festival goers have to battle are online. Food is just an arms reach away in the kitchen (no more popcorn dinners). 

Last year, SXSW was one of the first things cancelled as COVID-19 spread across the country. The festival is very different this year, but the quality of content is still great. The Film Experience will be covering the fest through the weekend.  Here are a four takes from Day One. One comedy doc, an intimate celebrity piece, a noir, and a Russian comedy... 

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Doc Corner: Tribeca Film Festival x4

By Glenn Dunks

The Tribeca Film Festival is sadly a no-go for 2020, but the teams behind some of the festival’s documentary selections have made their films available for press so we’re going to take a look at a few and hope that one day they make their way to screens for you in the future.

Let us start with a delight of a drag kiki in P.S. Burn This Letter Please, tracing an underground circuit of drag queens, female impersonators and gender illusionists in 1950s pre-Stonewall New York City. Prompted by the discovery of a box of letters all addressed to a mysterious man named Reno -- I won’t spoil the fun, but the recipient has ties to Michelle Pfeiffer! -- who kept them secret, and in doing so has kept alive a part of queer history that is too fabulous to stay hidden away. Through these letters and interviews with some of the surviving queens, directors Jennifer Tiexiera (an excellent editor of works such as Dragonslayer, one of my top documentaries of the decade, and 17 Blocks) and Michael Seligman (a producer on RuPaul’s Drag Race) untangle the insignificant dramas and life-changing moments of Daphne, Adrian, Claudia, Rita George and the rest of the gang.

Before Paris is Burning and even before The Queen, P.S. Burn This Letter Please offers insight where there has historically been so little. As one talking head explains, this is real gay history in black and white.

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