Roth, Phillip

1996

Awarded a Frameline Completion Fund grant this year, Philip B. Roth’s debut feature, Sex, Work and My American Family is the story of the filmmaker’s search for self identity working as an erotic masseur in New York City. Interviews with his uproarious Jewish family, including his 81 year-old grandmother, cast light on his struggles with male intimacy, spirituality and sex. The film features graphic erotic massages, a rare interview with German filmmaker Rosa von Praunheim, a demonstration in the use of Tampax by performance artist Annie Sprinkle, and Yiddish torch singer Nehama Lifshitz wailing on the soundtrack.

Spears, Peter

1996

The Festival presents your chance at a cheap date and some cheap thrills. It's Halloween and a serial killer with a taste for full-figured teenage girls is on the loose, but is Jackie de Palma (Jackie Beat) worried? She's far too busy consuming pizza pockets and her fey neighbor's Halloween candy and doing bong hits with her bad girlfriends to even notice she's in danger. A massacre of a slumber party, Scream, Teen, Scream has it all, most especially Lisa Blair (Alexis Arquette), a chain-smoking, spandex-wearing teenage vixen whose fun is temporarily put on pause when she catches her no-good lout of a boyfriend looking for lube in all the wrong places and finding it with her best friend, Jennie Lee Curtis (Robert Ring). No slumber party would be complete without heartbreak, sex, drugs, too many fattening treats and a trip to the Ouija Board in search of answers only the cranky ghost of Karen Carpenter can provide. You'll be scared out of your seats at the shocking surprise ending to this all-frills thriller. It's a scream!

Thorne, Kika

1996

[From IMDB]: "In a courageous, straight into the camera, monologue the film maker tells us what it's like to be the school fag. The only one that is out about being gay in a small town high school."

School Fag is a monologue by fabulously swishy and self-possessed 19-year-old Shawn Fowler, who waxes eloquent about his days as a Wonder Woman wannabe.

Defurne, Bavo

1996

Rereads the classic Sebastian legend

Holch, Meredith E.

1996

An anti-establishment dyke gets big-time revenge on her fly-by-night landlord.

1996

In the Rachel Williams Documentary, the Amazonian supermodel talks frankly to the camera about her uncompromising attitude toward her sexuality. Rachel reveals the reality of coming out in the glare of the media spotlight, and the intimacy of her relationship with rock singer Alice Temple. Taking the lid off the world of modeling and challenging the viewer with Rachel’s often outspoken views, this documentary is a rare insight into the world of the celebrity dyke.

Treleaven, Scott

1996

Brillant account of the thriving hompunk scene - queer renegades & iconoclasts, fast music and cool hair.

Nishimura, Akko

1996

A profile of Coleen Gragen, a 5th Degree Black Belt martial artist, teacher, and leader within the women's community.

Kotzer, Ran

1996

This is the story of an HIV carrier in Israel

Positive Story is a first-time glance into the world of people living with HIV and AIDS in Israel. As a child Avi used to sit for hours on one of the hills overlooking Tel-Aviv, dreaming of the day he would be free to live his life openly in the big metropolitan city. At the age of 17, Avi began discovering the gay world of Tel-Aviv: secret gardens, night clubs, cafes. At the age of 19, in a routine examination for HIV, Avi tested positive. Avi is rare among Israelis for his willingness to tell his story honestly and openly. In The Forbidden Love of the Hero a deceased Israeli Medical Corps Colonel's surviving partner attempts to obtain widower rights from the State of Israel. The program opens with a compelling new Frameline release, Faggots Are for Burning an intense, impressionistic and compelling melange of sound and image dealing with a young gay man's inner conflict with his sexuality and his own Christian Fundamentalism.

Ford, Dave

1996

(See "Pogo Trilogy")