In its 17th year The DC Reel Affirmations is one of the premiere GLBT festivals in the country.
To learn more about this wonderful organization go to www.reelaffirmations.org
Now for a few of the films!
For the Bible Tells Me So
Director: Daniel Karslake
Writers: Daniel G. Karslake, Helen R. Mendoza
Cast: Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Dick Gephardt, Chrissy Gephardt, Jane Gephardt, Reverend Jimmy Creech, Reverend Peter Gomes, Rabbi Steven Greenberg
Producer: Daniel Karslake
Awarded “Best Documentary” at Reel Affirmations 17, For the Bible Tells Me So is an eye-opening film indeed. The audience on Sunday October 21, 2007, at the Lincoln Theatre was made up of people whose eyes, hearts, and arms were already open. This film provides insight and ammunition for anyone present to articulately inform others that perhaps the Bible needn’t be the divisive tool it has come to be known as in our popular culture.
This film deals with vital individual struggles ongoing within five families that parallel the battles that are finally making headway in Christian churches. The audience takes in the experiences of how these intelligent, conscious families, firmly grounded in their Christian beliefs, grasp the discovery of having a gay child.
Among the issues that this film hits is that people who have been misusing the text of the Bible to support their anti-gay feelings and actions have been doing so for centuries by using the word of God through selective reading. One can take a quote out of context and use it to support one’s own argument at will. A fun example of everyone’s favorite anti-gay Bible verse, Leviticus, fails to mention that just prior to pointing out that if a man “lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination”, (merely a violation of ritual requirement, by the way) it also says that it is an abomination to eat shrimp, wear linen and wool.
I wish this film had taken a few moments to point out all six of the allegedly anti-gay verses and discredit them. It does refer to them, but it never articulates and dissects definitively what they are. It nails 3 of them on the head and makes them into mincemeat. (For the record, these are the legendary Leviticus 20:13, Genesis 18, 19, and Romans I.) Knocking all six out of the park would have taken that much more wind out of the sails anyone who still feels they might have any Biblical ground to stand on after seeing this.
Unfortunately, this film is preaching to the choir. Where were the insane Fred Phelps and his misguided followers? If just one of them could see the mother who drove away her lesbian daughter toward eventual suicide with misinterpreted Bible passages and who opened her heart and mind only too late…perhaps he or she could be reached.
How can this film reach the audience of the masses? How can this film gain admittance to the churches that are full of loving people who are only lacking this key information delivered so well -- in an experience-near fashion?
The five families featured in this film certainly weren’t beyond reach. For the Bible Tells Me So reinforces perhaps what many of us already know…that the most important Bible verse of all is Matthew 7:1, "judge not, that ye be not judged."
The Walker
Director: Paul Schrader
Cast: Woody Harrelson, Lilly Tomlin, Lauren Bacall, Kristin Scott Thomas
In his new film, The Walker, Director Paul Schrader has assembled a dazzling all-star cast. Woody Harrelson, Lauren Bacall, Lily Tomlin, Kristin Scott Thomas, Willem Dafoe and Ned Beatty have all come out to shine in this political thriller set in Washington DC.
The film centers on a social group of politicians’ wives and in particular on their friend, or “walker”, an openly gay man who accompanies them to various functions and benefits with which their husbands can’t be bothered. Nancy Reagan herself was said to have kept company with the seminal walker himself, Jerry Zipkin.
Some of the writing is full of wit and wisdom. The group’s game at the Hargrave hotel with the politicians’ wives reminded me of Truvy’s hair salon in Steel Magnolias with one-liners like, Lauren Bacall’s “ Here’s a piece of Washington advice – Never stand between a friend and a firing squad” and “Memory is a very unreliable organ; it’s right up there with the penis.” These Magnolias are dark flowers, however. Our walker, Carter’s, closest friend, Lynn, discovers the dead body of her lover. In helping her to avoid a scandal, Carter inadvertently focuses suspicions on himself by an overzealous conservative attorney.
If we focus on the plot and execution of The Walker in and of itself, it is a bit slow and disappointing. As a straight-on murder mystery, it is relatively slow. As my observant assistant, Jake, eloquently put it, “It was like a long episode of Murder She Wrote”. I’m inclined to agree. All that was missing was Angela Lansbury.
On the other hand, if we focus on its primary character of Carter Page III, the walker himself, and how he interacts with his girlfriends, his boyfriend, law enforcement, and DC society, this film does have quite a few sweet notes. Harrelson’s performance has more than a bit of specificity. He is flamboyant with his lady friends, while relaxed and comparatively grounded with his lover, Emek. Don’t many of us know people similar to Carter, who are forced to lead a double life of one kind or another, even in this day and age? Just watch him caress his pocket squares to release his tension.
Schrader makes a nice contrast between Carter’s public life in paralleling him in one scene at the stiff and formal National Theatre--and in his private life at the darkly lit 18th Amendment Bar. Again, he is two completely different people in the two different settings.
A huge problem with The Walker is that much of plot is given away by characters that we have trouble understanding…like the thickly accented Emek, and on occasion the deeply southern Carter. (And as a native Kentuckian, I can interpret a lot of southern) When we’re dealing with vital political details and we lose track of them, we lose a lot. Although we genuinely care about Carter and what happens to him, we haven’t developed enough of a bond with any of the other characters to force the focus of our attention on the outcomes for them.
Nina’s Heavenly Delights
Directed by: Pratibha Parmar
Starring: Laura Fraser, Art Malik, Ronny Jhutti, Veena Sood, Shelley Conn
Screenplay by: Andrea Gibb
Nina’s Heavenly Delights is a warm, enchanting tale of a first wave Indian family living in Glasgow, Scotland, their restaurant, and their loving daughter, Nina. We follow the story through Nina, beloved daughter of the Shah family. Nina left home several years before after breaking off an arranged engagement, estranging herself from her adoring father. She returns home following her father’s sudden death and funeral, and we watch her begin to rekindle several intriguing friendships.
One is with Bobbi, a young man who is driven to become a Bollywood movie queen. Bobbi is delightful and wise. He is the most light-hearted character in the film despite bucking social norms, comfortable in his own skin -- perhaps because he is not burdened with secrets. Another special friendship for Nina is with Lisa, who currently owns half of Nina’s family’s restaurant. As the story unfolds, Nina discovers that her father had a secret: He had reached the finals of a prominent curry cooking competition. A victory could resurrect the family business... and so much more! Lisa is eager to help Nina succeed.
As Lisa and Nina realize the ease with which they interact and connect is becoming more than just friendship, more than one conventional boundary is challenged. In words spoken to the audience before the screening, Director Pratibha Parmar said that she realizes images are powerful weapons in making people visible who are often invisible. She said that when undertaking a project, among the questions she first asks herself is, “Is this film going to make the world more humane or conscious?” I feel that she was very successful with this film, as I saw it as a family film.
Yes, these young ladies were indeed breaking through a social taboo. Ms. Parmar juxtaposes it in such a way that the entire family can relate to Nina’s experience. I thought this was done beautifully, in a way that all people who view this film can relate to the theme of love across boundaries, as several other people in the family were also breaking through their own social taboos simultaneously.
One’s sexual identity is vital, but is only a part of who one is. Too often people make such a huge issue of how one is different instead of what one shares with others. Nina and her family do relish their individuality, but also savor the heritage they share.
AUDIENCE AWARD WINNERS FOR REEL AFFIRMATIONS 17
Best Feature: The King and The Clown
Best Documentary: For The Bible Tells Me So
Best Male Short: Peking Turkey
Best Female Short: Happenstance
Review by Carolan Guernsey
For more DC Reel Affirmations Films, click here to go to our FestBlogs.
