Redding, Ben

1997

A young gay man, wants to be a skinhead but can’t decide which accessory to go for first: the hair, the boots, the jeans, or the tattoo. He decides on the tattoo, and his adventure begins.

1997

Chamberlain, Anne

1997

Tales of the Pit examines an old strip mine filled with water that has become a camping haven for lesbians and gay men in the area.

Nelson, Todd

1997

In a Hollywood homeless shelter, a group of runaways join together to create a play about abuse in the home, growing up gay and lesbian, and surviving on the streets.

There are 1.4 million homeless youth on the streets of America; about a third of them are gay, lesbian, bi or transgender. They are runaways, and some are "throw-aways," abandoned or forcefully exiled from their family homes. These young people endure familial abuse, drugs and alcohol, prostitution, and life on the streets; many attempt suicide. In 1992, seventy homeless youth — of various racial, cultural and sexual identities — registered for a theater project in the Hollywood shelter where they lived. This project encouraged them to share their stories. Of the original seventy, ten completed the project and became performers, playing roles from each others’ lives. Surviving Friendly Fire documents the creative process they went through to create the 1993 play, Friendly Fire, which was the centerpiece of the prestigious Los Angeles Festival before it played to great acclaim in high schools throughout the city.

DiNovis, Kevin

1997

Surrender Dorothy is a bold and compelling psycho-sexual cross-dressing drama which offers a different, and in many ways decidedly controversial, twist to its treatment of same-sex relationships. Essentially a two-character story grittily enacted in a dank factory loft, the film focuses on two young men: 26-year old Trevor (Peter Pryor), an angry, sexually confused busboy tormented by an intense fear of women; and Lanh (director Kevin DiNovis), a heroin addict who needs a place to crash after stealing a drug stash from his former roommate. What begins as a simple house-sharing arrangement quickly escalates into a frenzied battle of manipulation, co-dependency, and gender-bending submission. The two men are nominally straight; is it repression of their true sexual desires that causes them to enter into and remain in such a profoundly tangled relationship? A troubling but refreshing departure from the oftentimes saccharine approach prevalent in gay-themed films today, Surrender Dorothy is full of ambiguous and compelling situations which will stay with you long after the house lights have come up.

Hardwick, Liz

1997

Girl hero and lesbian nation: You never know what Superdyke might do. A girl hero takes on the lesbian nation.

Trepanier, Tania

1997

Rhada and Anna are expecting a visitor -- Aunt Durga -- from India, who is not sure what to make of their relationship.

Mubashshir, Daaimah

1997

Takes a look at the relationship between the self, body image, mother and money.

Wescott, Margaret

1997

This haunting, humorous and poignant feature documentary, narrated by Academy-Award nominated actress Kate Nelligan, combines hidden aspects of lesbian history and contemporary lesbian life and culture.

Monumental, beguiling, and erotic, Stolen Moments is an exquisitely-executed documentary on lesbian lifestyles in the Western World, combining stylized historical dramas with incisive commentary on contemporary lesbian life. Director Margaret Wescott (Behind the Veil: Nuns) masterfully weaves together diverse historical stories – of Janet Bonet's 19th-century perils on the Barbary Coast, Paris soirées in the 1920’s, and pre-war Amsterdam and Berlin – with tales of contemporary struggles and victories around butchness, femmeness, non-monogamy, and discrimination. Stolen Moments is an intimate and celebratory experience with Audre Lorde, Joan Nestle, Judith Grahn, Leslie Feinberg, and Nicole Brossard, and is narrated by Kate Nelligan.

Ozpetek, Ferzan

1997

When Francesco inherits a dilapidated Turkish bath from a forgotten aunt, he leaves his unfaithful wife Marta in Rome and heads to Istanbul to dispose of the property. The transaction seems straightforward enough. But then Francesco sees the bathhouse, and to his own surprise, he falls in love with it and with the fading culture it represents. He also falls in love with the caretaker’s beautiful son Mehmet. Francesco decides to stay on in Istanbul to renovate the bath. Everything seems to be going smoothly until a shady real estate conglomerate which wants his land begins to threaten him. And when Marta shows up unexpectedly and discovers him making love with Mehmet, confrontation becomes unavoidable. This lush and beautifully photographed film was originally Turkey’s nomination for the Best Foreign Film Academy Award, until the Ministry of Culture pulled it, allegedly because of its bisexual hero. Evocative and lovely to look at, Steam deals with universal themes – the difficulties of communication and nostalgia for the past – and lovingly pulls the audience into a disappearing world.