Gallery Carre
Screening: Paris is Burning (Film Society of Lincoln Center)
Aug 4th, 2024 by Viviane
PARIS IS BURNING
with
WHO’S THE TOP?
SAT, AUG 6: 6:30 & 9:15 (followed by Q&A)
In the late 80s, filmmaker Jennie Livingston spent two years shooting a documentary about the Harlem drag balls, organized by the various local “”houses”” (of Ninja, Labeija and Xtravaganza), in which black and Hispanic transsexuals and transvestites vogue for the top prizes in such categories as Femme Queen Realness, Military, and Executive Wear. To put it mildly, Paris Is Burning took the movie world by storm, winning the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance and a series of awards at film festivals around the world, and playing an unprecedented 17 weeks at Film Forum. It is truly one of the key works of the American Independent movement, and it remains a humanistic touchstone —— enriching, exciting, and, as a portrait of people who have to be stronger than they can imagine just to get up in the morning and make it through the day, to paraphrase the father of a drag queen in the movie.
Jennie Livingston will be joining us to discuss her landmark movie and present her smart, stylish new short Who’s the Top? Alixe (Marin Hinkle) enjoys a semi-happy, stable relationship with her partner Gwen (Brigitte Bako), but has an itch to explore new territory —— sexual and, she later discovers, emotional. Livingston looks past questions of homo- or hetero-, and peers directly at sexuality itself: the role it plays in all our lives, the way it can be an escape, an adventure, or the point of a new and unexpected discovery. Once again, Livingston made a movie that is both probing (physically and intellectually) and, thanks to the black-and-white sexual fantasy musical numbers (choreographed by Urinetown’s John Carrafa), highly entertaining.
afterword: I attended the 6:30 screening. Before the Q&A, Willie Ninja and his crew did a number. The important news is that the DVD of ‘Paris is Burning’ will be released on September 5th (by Disney, which bought Miramax). It will include commentary by the director, Willie Ninja and John Oppenheimer, the editor.
gay, GLBT