Happily, Warner Brothers and the filmmakers behind Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore have openly flouted ‘Don’t Say Gay’ absurdities with the third installment of the Fantastic Beasts franchise. Right out of the gate, Dumbledore (Jude Law) and Gridelwald (Mads Mikkelsen) talk about the love and devotion they once had for each other. No one is hit over the …
Perhaps you’ve heard about Art Spiegelman’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Holocaust-era graphic novel Maus, which has gotten a lot of press lately for being banned in Tennessee. That press probably made it even more famous and widely read. It’s a gorgeous, culturally valuable book, and it should be celebrated. So too, should Leben? Oder Theater? (Life? or Theatre?), an …
Whenever filmmaking team of Betsy West and Julie Cohen are slated to release a new documentary, I get excited. They have a way of being sensitive and hard-hitting in equal measure. What is most striking about their new documentary Gabby Giffords: Won’t Back Down is how, for most of the duration of the film, viewers will likely …
Anyone who thinks women have equality can look to continued the lawsuits and struggles for acceptance for equal pay in the sports world. It can be really depressing. Those who need a jolt of positivity can watch the new documentary Skate Dreams, the first film ever made about the rise of women’s skateboarding. It features profiles …
Australian writer/directors Hanna Barlow and Kane Senes bring mean girls, social media savagery, fear of being cancelled, the repercussions of childhood trauma, and gore, gore, gore to their comedy horror mashup Sissy. Aisha Dee is both luminescent and looney tunes as the title character Sissy, or as she has calls herself to her 200,000 IG followers, …
As a hybrid documentary, Sell/Buy/Date is one freaky little non-movie, or what ‘I-can-do-it-all’ poster gal, writer/director/producer/performer Sarah Jones calls an ‘unorthodoc’. Sell/Buy/Date considers how the sex industry is at the intersection of race, feminism, power, and money, through the lens of one Black woman with many voices seeking to better understand sex work. The Tony Award-winning playwright and performer …
If you’ve ever been to a Pride march, a rally for Human Rights Watch, or some other LGBTQ-centered public gathering, you’ve probably seen them: women of a certain age with tees that say “Free Mom Hugs”. If you’re gay, there’s a good chance at some point they actively tried to restrict your rights. They are …
Shown first at the Angoulême Film Festival in 2020, My Best Part (Garçon Chiffon in French) is finally opening in New York, LA, and on streaming services on February 25th. This film, which toured the fest circuit including TIFF, Newfest, and OUTshine, is the directorial debut of actor Nicolas Maury, best known in the US for his role …
The new documentary release The Automat teaches many things about the power of nostalgia, the history of New York City, the benevolence of companies long gone, and the egalitarianism of a 5 cent cup of coffee, but before all else, it teaches audiences that Mel Brooks has been and always will be a force. He’s the guy …
Hello, my name is Leslie, and I’m addicted to disaster movies. I have literally seen every incarnation of Airport, both Poseidon Adventures. I’ve even seen Beyond the Poseidon Adventure. For me, watching them offers the perfect cinematic mixture of schadenfreude, catharsis, and hope. So regardless of the fact that my chosen beat is to amplify the independent works …
