Ashley, Carol
Clark, Kathy

1990

Recalling early gender limitation/formation, two women enact male bathroom rituals with style and fun.

Wilhelm, Bettina

1990

Orlanda is a person between male and female. His/her profession is diseuse, a performer who entertains with songs and speeches in the German tradition of the `20s and `30s. To escape from loneliness, as well as to play with taboos, Orlanda decides to marry her friend Elizabeth. On a concert tour in Warsaw, which also serves as a honeymoon, both the newlyweds fall in love with a charming young Polish man. This quite special marriage offers material for comedy as well as melodrama, cleverly commented on by Orlanda's songs. Georgette Dee as Orlanda is playing him/herself. The gender ambiguity that characterizes Dee makes it impossible to see these characters as simply straight, gay, or lesbian. Mechtild Grossmann displays a talent for both comedy and tragedy that she hasn't used before, and while All Of Me is meant to be fun, it has a serious side as well. Like Seduction: The Cruel Woman, in which these two actresses played the parts of Frederike and Wanda, respectively, the film is also embedded in the German tradition that, with wit and insight, explores ways to play with gender roles in film.

Praunheim, Rosa von

1990

Rosa von Praunheim's best film yet is a homage to larger-than-life actress Lotti Huber (most recently, star of von Praunheim's film, Anita—Dances of Vice). She describes her careers as dancer, wife, restaurateur, concentration camp prisoner, and full-time eccentric. Full of gay humor and bruised egos, Affengeil—it means something like “apeshit”—is a generous, affectionate, and lively movie.

Acklin, Claudia

1990

"My name is André Ratti; I am 50 years old; I am a homosexual and I've got AIDS." When André Ratti on July 2, 1984 dropped this bombshell at a press conference organized for "AIDS-Help Switzerland," it prompted a tremendous reaction. A man who, through his TV show "MTW," had weekly visited the good Swiss citizen, dared to tackle the two biggest taboos of his society – sexuality and death. Living and Dying examines the life of a complex, difficult man who refused to make things easy for the people around him by bowing to their conceptions of sexuality and illness. He was a homosexual who craved sex and had little need for the romantic relationships sought by so many of his peers. He inspected his AIDS without sentiment or sorrow and never allowed it to interfere with his popular "issues and discussion" TV talk show. Expressing his opinions over the Swiss airwaves was as much heaven as he ever needed. Director Claudia Acklin has gathered an engaging collection of Ratti's coworkers and friends to share their memories, successfully mixing them with clips from Ratti's show and interviews conducted over the years of his illness. While Living and Dying should capture both your heart and mind, it's not likely to make you cry. That's probably just what this spirited man would have wanted.

Vachon, Christine

1989

The Way of the Wicked is a caustic but liberating commentary on the repression of the female body in Catholicism. Drawn as an action film, it shows a girl who plans to bite the holy wafer right after her first communion. Two women rush out and bring her to a safe place, where they can celebrate the reappropriation of the body and the blood.

Hick, Jochen

1989

Frank is a German Lufthansa steward who travels the world, taking photos of boys he has sex with—he's a collector. One hot night in his favorite city, Rio de Janeiro, Frank picks up Mario and takes him to his hotel. The morning after, Mario is gone, leaving only a chilling epitaph, written in lipstick, on the bathroom mirror, "Welcome to the AIDS club." Via Appia begins in Germany as Frank shows the first signs of HIV infection. A friend wants to shoot a documentary about him, so Frank convinces the film crew to go to Rio, in the hopes that he might find Mario, the alleged source of his infection. Jose, a handsome young hustler, becomes Frank's guide through bathhouses and beaches—and the Via Appia, a street where male prostitutes openly offer their services. From Rio to Saõ Paolo, the film takes the viewer into a world of beautiful bodies, sex, money, and murder. But it also allows us a closer look at a German man's psyche as he deals with a disease that he knows can kill him. Although Via Appia plays like a documentary, it is a fiction feature by Jochen Hick, a Hamburg film student. Originally produced for German television, its controversial subject caused the student to preempt its broadcast. Via Appia finally did air in August of 1990.

Cole, Jeff

1989

Boxwell, Tim

1989

In 29 Effeminate Gestures, performance artist/choreographer Joe Goode portrays an auto repairman who tunes up the more feminine side of his nature.

Doucette, Robert

1989

Triangle is this year's only animated entry: a sad, sweeping story set against bohemian Berlin and the rise of Nazi power.

Bogart, Paul

1989