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June 18-24, 2015 • BAY AREA REPORTER • 25
The butch mystique at Frameline by Erin Blackwell
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ll lesbian love entanglements start to resemble each other, as do the films that attempt to capture the falling-in and falling-out of states of mutual attraction and repulsion, loneliness and sex, orgasm and threesomes. That’s okay, since behavior that repeats across cultures stands the best chance of crossing borders, opening minds, and reaching hearts. Frameline, an international festival of LGBTQ films, proudly represents the multinational movement to project images of queer experience, locally hosted by neighborhood cinemas Castro, Roxie, and Victoria in San Francisco; Oakland’s Piedmont, and Berkeley’s Elmwood, starting tonight, June 18. Liz in September (Castro, 6/19; Piedmont, 6/22), directed by Fina Torres, is a sultry, somewhat sluggish melodrama adapted from Jane Chambers’ milestone play Last Summer at Bluefish Cove (1981) and moved to Venezuela. Chambers got lesbian lives onto the New York stage by sticking to conventional dramatic structure, so even when new they were already creaking. In this ensemble piece centered on a cancer diagnosis, three lesbian couples hang out at singleton Margot’s beachside B&B, eating, drinking, winking, and nudging. Intense, raven-haired, sinewy, plaid-shirted, motorcycle-riding, scuba-diving, competitive-jogging, fish-catching Liz goes after Eva, a pretty young wife who’s lost her young son. There’s lots of champagne-fueled camaraderie amidst tropical greenery near open water and a coral reef, piano and strings, SUVs, handpainted walls, black-and-white flashbacks, and a glimpse of a full moon amidst the clouds. The Russian and Austrian coproduction Olya’s Love (Roxie, 6/20) only plays once, at 11 a.m. on Saturday, and the Roxie’s not that big. This documentary has all the oomph one hopes for in a queer romantic narrative and none of the filler that so often causes dyke films to implode in puddles of self-and-
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Courtesy Frameline
Courtesy Frameline
Scene from director Fina Torres’ Liz in September.
Scene from producer-directors Kirill and Ksenia Sakharnov’s Olya’s Love.
other-absorption. Olya Kuracheva is a tall, willowy femme, urban queer activist with chocolate brown dreds, wolf-blue eyes, and an infectious je ne sais quoi masking an aching need to lead an expansive life of integrity. The love of her life is short, muscular, butch handyman Galya Galeeva, who makes small repairs to Olya’s small Moscow apartment, crisscrossed with their undies and T-shirts drying on clotheslines. They’re adorable, they’re in love, and they’re fighting for their rights. Producing-directing combine Kirill and Ksenia Sakharnov move easily from Olya and Galya’s intimate private lives to the pushback on the streets after passage of Russia’s 2014 anti-gay-propaganda bill, aka the “On Protecting Children from Information Harmful to Their Health and Development” law. Olya is a sympathetic, charismatic, passionate young woman whose heart is destined to break both for herself and for her country. S&M Sally (Roxie, 6/21; Victoria, 6/26) stars writer-director Michelle Ehlen of Butch Jamie fame, known for her urbane spin on the comedy of subtle self-humiliation, L.A. style. This naughty rom-com tracks Jamie’s bumbling descent into bondage and fire play with her subletting girlfriend Jill, who’s been around the BDSM scene and finds Jamie’s attempts to wriggle in and out of es-
Scene from director Alante Kavaite’s The Summer of Sangaile.
capades mildly amusing. Ehlen has a lock on communicating butch existential angst, the fear of non-self in the presence of a dom, with a slight lift of the eyebrows and a freezing of the eyes, hysterical. The highlight might be Jill in white corset leading Jamie in tuxedo T-shirt on a leash around a club. It takes a particular comic chutzpah to pull off such slender material. All About E (Castro, 6/22; Piedmont, 6/24), directed by Louise Wadley, could be considered a multiculti lesbian spin on The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994), updated and grafted onto the perennially crowd-pleasing chased-by-gangsters genre. When people get in trouble in Australia, they head for the Outback, and so it is with E, a daughter of homophobic Lebanese immigrants and wife to her gay best buddy. When the couple find a bag full of money in a taxi and discover their flat’s been trashed, they get the hell out of Sydney. The road trip coincidentally leads E back to the levelheaded, selfaccepting, blonde ex-girlfriend she ditched to stay in the closet. Sworn Virgin (Roxie, 6/22; Elmwood, 6/24), co-produced by Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Albania, and Kosovo, offers a fictional glimpse of an ancient tradition of women allowed to live openly as men within a strictly patriarchal culture. Laura
Courtesy Frameline
Bispuri’s film starts with Mark’s boat trip and bus ride to Milan, to the apartment of childhood friend Lila, now married with a teenage daughter intrigued by the weird newcomer. Flashbacks to his remote Albanian village document Mark’s incremental transition from tomboy to patriarch. The scrawny, withdrawn, slouching, squinting Mark finds work in a parking garage, gets his own apartment, tries on bras, and has furtive sex in a men’s room. The Summer of Sangaile (Castro, 6/23) is stunning on so many levels it’d be a shame to tear the thing apart just to be able to name its
Frameline 39
From page 22
Tradesman’s Exit You may love the unexpected catharsis possible for some viewers of this twisted fairy-tale about a handy guy who finds it hard to let go, to the extreme displeasure of his exasperated ex. Drag Mama A little boy and a “Fairy Drag Mama” have some nifty fun in Australian Benjamin Strum’s dark-humor fairy-tale excursion. One Year Lease Brian Bolster recalls his most annoying landlady via his old answering-machine tapes. The name Rita may never sound the same after this one. Pipe Dream The teen son of two gay male daddies has a terrifying bout of size issues, which are uniquely resolved with the aid of an unusually understanding girlfriend. Mini Supreme A world-weary drag queen creates a scene at a little girl’s beauty-contest pageant. Will especially appeal to fans of Little Miss Sunshine. (Castro, 6/20, 28) Fun in Girls Shorts The girls get their “really big show” in this 87-minute, deli-like sample plate of lesbian humor. 11 Life Lessons from an Awesome Old Dyke Allison Khoury mediates this big advice from a very butch old dyke from Minnesota’s Twin Cities. V is the Warmest Color is director Anna Margarita Albelo’s spoof of a female creature, “the Vagina,” who stirs up quite a hornet’s nest of ambivalent feelings among a gaggle of out lesbians. Be Here Nowish: Episode 2 Nata-
Courtesy Frameline
Scene from director Jenni Olson’s The Royal Road.
lia Leite and Alexandra Roxo comically exploit the possibilities of the one-night-stand from hell. Whatever We Want To Be The free-swinging Dylan gets a taste of her own chutzpah from the very shrewd dyke Sam in this funny bar tale from Stephanie Williams. Code Academy Nisha Ganatra’s inventive sci-fi short is a brilliant finale with implications that cry out for full-length feature exploration. (Castro, 6/20, 28) That’s Not Us William Sullivan directs this Fire Island-set improvisational couples comedy, constructed from the scripts the three couples created to show how tough it is to keep romance alive, no matter how attractive your partner might be. (Castro, 6/21) Those People Director Joey
Kuhn zeroes in on a combustible male erotic trio, inviting comparisons to the characters and privileged environs of Evelyn Waugh. (Castro, 6/19) In the Grayscale Chilean director Claudio Marcone draws us into the early mid-life crisis of a Santiago architect when he leaves his hetero marriage for a fling with a male tour guide. (Victoria, 6/23/; Castro, 6/28) A Woman Like Me No filmmaker expects that her last work, perhaps her most vital, will be an empathetic portrait of her own death from breast cancer. Alex Sichel begins her report to us before we glimpse her face with a piece of Buddhist mediation on death. “The point is, we’re all going to die. It sounds so obvious, but that’s the point that I won’t accept. Somehow I’m going to
Courtesy Frameline
Scene from directors Christine Zeidler & John Mitchell’s Portrait of a Serial Monogamist.
be the exception. It’s crazy!” Completed by sister filmmaker Elizabeth Giamatti, A Woman Like Me speaks to mortal beings across the universe. (Roxie, 6/20) The Royal Road Jenni Olson’s evocative film poem to California’s most fabulous highway, the 600-mile-long El Camino Real, begins where all good films about film should, by quoting the master Billy Wilder from his 1950 masterwork Sunset Blvd. The image of William Holden’s character floating upside-down and very dead in Gloria Swanson’s mad character’s swimming pool is too good to improve on, and so far nobody has. But Olson makes a very imaginative and tres literary stab by beginning
constituent wonders. Sangaile is another in a series of troubled butches, who cuts her inner arms with the sharp point of a metal compass in the privacy of her parents’ designer chalet. Director Alante Kavaite isn’t in it for the gore, don’t worry. Fortunately, the poor little rich girl meets a populist femme at an airshow who sweeps her off her feet. Auste’s bohemian universe is the perfect cure for Sangaile’s social alienation. The camera, the costumes, the sensitivity of this co-production from Lithuania, France, and the Netherlands evokes the healing dream world of true love.t her journey with the chapter heading, (1) “My Hollywood Love Story.” Yes, friends, we all have them, and Olson’s don’t disappoint. Many moons ago it took me four hours to complete the drive from an East San Jose radio station to my Castro-area flat. I was working on a radio doc on the slain San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk. I was so exhausted I had to pull over every 30 minutes for a quick cat nap in my news car. Imagine my pleasure when Olson’s The Royal Road proves a speedy delight, without rest stops or sleepy moments. (Castro, 6/19; Elmwood, 6/22) How to Win at Checkers (Every Time) Thai director Josh Kim explores the impact his country’s military draft lottery has on one working-class family. (Castro, 6/20) All About E Australian director Louise Wadley builds her feature around the life of a top Sydney club DJ. (Castro, 6/22; Piedmont, 6/24) Alto Mikki del Monico’s debut feature has a uniquely queer-friendly angle on a New York mob-family tale. (Roxie, 6/23) Beautiful Something Joseph Graham offers multiple takes on Philadelphia boys in love. Beautiful Something becomes a night in the lives of gay characters of all ages, with time flashbacks that resemble those in the Gus Van Sant classic Elephant. (Castro, 6/22) Portrait of a Serial Monogamist Canadians Christine Zeidler & John Mitchell explore Toronto’s See page 32 >>