MAIN FEATURE

Cinema queens
Gay films are being screened all over the borough

By Gerard Robinson
Friday, February 18, 2005

A Mexican town in which homosexuality is not only accepted but regarded as a blessing; an exploration of the life of a farm boy who has grown up to become a fabulous drag queen in a place as strange as North Carolina; a look at life on the “down low” as it is lived by two men who are members of a neighborhood gang as well as lovers.

These are a few of the promising topics that are among the national and international gay films receiving weekly screenings in a new series taking place in Flushing Meadows and Woodside, Queens, from February through May.

Cinemarosa will feature eight independent fiction and documentary films, all shown on the third Sunday afternoon of the month at the Queen’s Museum of Art and again on the last Thursday evening of the month at the Queen’s Pride House. The films will be presented as double features and will be followed by panel discussions with directors, producers, actors and artists.

This year’s Spring 2005 Cinemarosa film series is a continuation of last year’s program. The series is sponsored by Queen’s Pride House through a small grant from New York City’s Department of Cultural Affairs.

The program is curated by Hector Canonge, a filmmaker and New Media Artist in his own right. He has not included his own work in the series.

Canonge said he was inspired to put together the screenings because he sees a gay cultural vacuum in Queens despite the fact that a robust gay Hispanic neighborhood is flourishing in Jackson Heights; gay Europeans, Asians and South Asians have settled in Richmond Hills; Woodside and Forest Hills house many transgendered people, as well as gay couples there and in Kew Gardens.

“In the last 10 years, Queens has become the largest gay community in the area outside of Manhattan,” Canonge said. “You don’t have to go to Manhattan to see a rainbow of sexual identities and gender benders. You can see them right on the streets of Queens.

“But,” he continued, “I didn’t see that reflected in cultural offerings in the borough so I decided to create one. I wanted to create a gay cultural hub in Queens. We are not just in the bars; we are also contributing to the community.”

• First up is “Juchitan: Queer Paradise,” directed by Patricio Enriquez, a portrait of a small Mexican town near the Guatemalan border where gays are regarded as a third gender. Parents rejoice when their children turn out to be queer and a man who wants to dress as a woman has only to do so to be treated as a woman by the community at large. The documentary profiles a teacher, a hairdresser and a shop owner.

Juchitan is home to the Zapotec Indians who believe that according to legend, God gave the patron saint of the town, Vincente Ferrer, a bagful of queers. Everywhere he traveled — Columbia, Central America, Guatemala — he left behind a homosexual. In Juchitan, however, his bag broke, and they all tumbled out at once.

In the film, which focuses, though not exclusively, on cross-dressers, we see how homosexuals are accepted, if not revered by the townspeople. Transvestites have their place in society, though they mostly do women’s work, like cooking and hairdressing and a bit of prostitution (this part is definitely downplayed).

The town is hardly free of stereotypes or homophobia. But by and large homosexuals are regarded as part of the natural order of things.

Screening with this film is Miles Christian Daniels’ “Dixie Queen,” which explores the intersection of redneck homophobia with southern hospitality in the life of Tara Nicole, a drag queen in Wilmington, North Carolina, who grew up on a small farm in the state. Like “Juchitan,” this is a documentary in which location is paramount.

The movie chronicles the camaraderie as well as competitiveness of the half dozen or more drag queens who perform at Ibiza, the town’s only gay bar. Wilmington is considered the big-time for girls who grew up in its small satellite towns.

Tara Nicole is a big man who only comes alive when dressed as a woman. In interviews out of drag, he’s so shy he never looks at the camera directly. It’s only as a woman that we can see how big his personality is. Though the film is mostly upbeat, it doesn’t shy away from dilemmas like where to go for breast implants in a backwater state like North Carolina. Tara has had unsuccessful silicone injections that have left him hideously scarred, but he is determined to try again once his wounds heal. He’s considering full gender reassignment. One hopes he will come to an urban metropolis if that comes to pass.

A father comes to terms with his son’s budding sexuality in ‘In Any House.’

The movie features elaborate drag performances as well as interviews with family, friends and other Southern drag queens like the Lady Bunny, Wilmington’s most famous native son-daughter. While Bunny got out of Wilmington and came to the Big Apple, the others will end up staying — mostly because of family ties.

• March will bring “I Am Who I Am” (“Yo Soy Asi”), by Chilean filmmaker Joui Turandot. It is the story of a transgendered woman who recounts her experience in becoming a man in a society rife with machismo and homophobia.

The film acknowledges that transgendered people have achieved their rights in some societies but that transphobia is rampant in many others, particularly in heavily and devoutly Roman Catholic Latin America.

Director Luis Ulloa’s fiction film, “In Any House” (“En Cualquier Casa”), tells a simple short story in 13 minutes: a Mexican immigrant returns home unexpectedly one afternoon and discovers his handsome son in bed with another boy. The movie is about how they come to terms with one another and achieve something like normality.

• In April, Cinemarosa presents a documentary about a struggling gay Puerto Rican performance artist, John Falco, who became an overnight media sensation after he won the New York State Lottery in 1999. “One Man Show: a Musical Documentary,” by filmmaker Ira Rosensweig, examines the life of a man who tells his story through a one-man show made possible through his lottery winnings.

‘Juchitan: Queer Paradise’ is exactly what the title describes: a real Mexican town not only embraces its gay children, it honors them.

Accompanying “One Man Show,” is the thematically similar “Laughing Matters,” a documentary by Andrea Meyerson. Funny ladies Kate Clinton, Marga Gomez, Suzanne Westenhoefer and Karen Williams received the full biography treatment. The film describes their backgrounds, life and humor through performance footage and interviews and traces their success as comediennes in a comedy circuit still remarkably sexist and homophobic.

• In May, two fiction films explore minority gay populations through some indirect angles.

The first presents a view of life in the ‘hood. In “On the Down Low,” Director Tadeo Garcia makes his feature debut. Two young Latino men manage a sexual relationship as well as life in a gang on the tough south side of Chicago. The two men aren’t skilled in keeping secrets and the result of their double life has violent and tragic consequences.

“Rosa Negra,” directed by Viva Ruiz, uses a soap opera style to explore the life of a young Latina woman of contradictory sexual urges who is nonetheless searching for true love.

about us

© 2008 |  HX Media, LLC  | Privacy Policy