Winter, Stephen

1993

An African-American New York couple battle with infidelity and other demons in Stephen Winter's Here Be Dragons.

Glatzer, Richard

1993

Grief is a bittersweet comedy set behind the scenes on a bad daytime TV drama, starring Last Exit to Brooklyn's Alexis Arquette, Swoon's Craig Chester, and Illeana Douglas from Alive. It's a low-budget, big-laugh Soapdish-y riff. The TV show is in trouble. Jo, the ebullient, chain-smoking producer, is leaving to become a Hungarian housewife; the men in suits upstairs are squeezing the budget; the photocopier keeps breaking down; and, worst of all, someone is leaving nighttime cum stains on the office sofa. Clearly, the courtroom drama's bizarre on-screen confessions—involving lesbian trapeze artists and schizophrenic housewives—are but nothing compared to the backstage antics. Melancholy Bill (Craig Chester) and patronizing Paula (Nicholas Nicklebly's Lucy Gutteridge) are prime candidates to replace Jo, but it's a tough choice. Besides, Bill is still recovering from the year-old loss of his boyfriend, and he's caught up in a foolish crush on Alexis Arquette. Grief delivers something we've been lacking for a long time: smart, uncomplicated old-fashioned comedy—decked out in ‘90s style. Director Richard Glatzer used to produce “Divorce Court,” so the film has a true sense of the absurdity of cheap television. All the performances are shamefully good; Kent Fuhr is a standout as Jo, the Eve Ardenesque TV producer, combination den mother and dragon lady. And on top of all this, Glatzer throws in some amusing courtroom cameos, including Mary Woronov and Paul Bartel. Winner of the 1993 San Francisco International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival Audience Award for Best Feature.

Spiro, Ellen

1993

Spiro, Ellen

1993

Videomaker Ellen Spiro captures the people, places, politics, and queer roadside signs of the South. In a series of vivid moving picture postcards, Spiro visits landmarks, events, and just plain characters, including the Gay Rodeo, Mardi Gras, Gay Pride in Atlanta, Rhythmfest women's music festival, the Short Mountain Radical Faerie sanctuary, Dollywood, and Miss Miller's Eternal Love and Care Pet Cemetery. Interviews with gay men and lesbians along the way convey the range of Southern lives—from Iris, a black lesbian living in a bus in the Ozarks to Rita, a retired military officer, now a drag queen in New Orleans. With strength and insight, the interviews in Greetings from Out Here addresses the politics of being out in the South, the impact of AIDS in the rural South, and the relation between the gay and civil rights movements.

Bushala, Dean

1993

An important documentary about antigay violence in America, Green on Thursdays also has a snappy, modern, no-voice-over style.

Maytorena-Taylor, Jennifer

1993

Dutch girls lip synch to a Disney ditty and visit the Folsom St. Fair.

Smith, Jo

1993

Drawn from Christina Rossetti's notoriously lesbo-erotic poem, this is a lush and sexy period piece.

Reeder, Andre

1993

Made for Dutch TV, and clearly influenced by the style of British TV's OUT, Glad To Be Gay, Right? shows the difference of having a black director; three out of these five gripping coming-out stories are told by people of color.

Deming, Heidi

1993

A drag king date where they skip dinner and a movie. Released in the U.S. as part of She’s Safe, a feature-length package of lesbian safe-sex videos.

Kalin, Tom

1993