Outfest 2010: Starring James Franco as gay poet Allen Ginsberg, Howl is kicking off this year’s event
Documentarians Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman’s Howl, their debut narrative feature, is the Opening Night Gala screening at the 28th Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Film Festival (Outfest) at the Orpheum Theatre in downtown Los Angeles on July 8.
Starring James Franco, David Strathairn, Jon Hamm, Mary-Louise Parker, Bob Balaban, Alessandro Nivola, Aaron Tveit, Treat Williams, and Jeff Daniels, Howl tells the story of counter-culture poet Allen Ginsberg (Franco), who became embroiled in a public obscenity trial in 1957 after writing the poem “Howl,” which made the usual sex-crazed prudes go ballistic thanks to lines such as “…who let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy.”
Howl was the opening night film at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival and was screened at the Berlin Film Festival.
Oscilloscope Laboratories will release Howl in theaters and VOD on September 24.
The complete movie line-up for Outfest 2010 will be announced on June 2. The festival will be held July 8–18.
For more information on becoming a member of Outfest, please visit www.outfest.org.
Passage from “Howl” via the Poetry Foundation.
Aluízio Abranches’ Do Começo ao Fim / From Beginning to End, Donatella Maiorca’s Viola di mare / Purple Sea, Steve Balderson’s Stuck!, and the two short film showcases “Queerer Than Fiction” and “Flesh 4 Fantasy” are among the presentations at Outfest 2010, the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, on Friday, July 9.
Starring João Gabriel Vasconcellos and Rafael Cardoso as two super-hunky half-brothers involved in an idealized romantic relationship, From Beginning to End opened in Brazil in late 2009, where it has done well in the arthouse circuit despite wildly mixed reviews and a number of complaints that the film lacks dramatic cohesion. Also in the cast: Júlia Lemmertz, Lucas Cotrin, Gabriel Kaufmann, Fábio Assunção, and veteran Louise Cardoso.
Featuring Isabella Ragonese and Valeria Solarino, Purple Sea (“The Sea Purple” on the IMDb) tells the story of a lesbian love affair in rabidly patriarchal 19th-century Sicily. Also in the cast: the excellent Ennio Fantastichini.
Stuck! is described as a tongue-in-cheek homage to 1950s prison dramas. If it’s half as good as either John Cromwell’s Caged or Renato Castellani’s Nella città l’inferno / …and the Wild, Wild Women, it should definitely be worth a look. Starina Johnson stars as the wrongly imprisoned Daisy. John Waters’ regular Mink Stole is one of her cellmates, while veteran Karen Black is the woman who helped send poor Daisy to the Big House.
Among the documentary short films featured in the “Queerer Than Fiction” program (for once the word “queer” is put to good use) are Steven Wilsey’s At Night I was Beautiful, in which a young man recalls his days as a sex worker in New York City, and Jessica Sanders’ George & Brad in Bed, in which the bedmates in question are Star Trek’s George Takei and spouse Brad Altman.
The “Flesh 4 Fantasy” narrative short compilation features James Franco’s The Feast of Stephen, winner of the Berlin Film Festival’s Teddy Award for best gay-themed short; Gui Ashcar’s Professor Godoy, about a Brazilian high-school teacher (Roney Facchini) whose uneventful life takes a radical turn after a handsome student (Kauê Telloli) raises a mathematical challenge; and Jamie Travis’ The Armoire, which received a Special Mention in the Best Canadian Film category at the Toronto Film Festival.
JC Calciano’s Is It Just Me?.
JC Calciano’s Is It Just Me?, Anna Margarita Albelo’s Hooters!, Roberto Moreira’s Paulista, and Nicole Conn’s Elena Undone are some of the films screening at Outfest 2010 on Friday, July 16.
Is It Just Me? is a West Hollywood-set romantic comedy that borrows plot elements from Cyrano de Bergerac: Blaine (Nicholas Downs) falls in love with Xander (David Loren) after chatting with him online. The glitch is that the profile picture Blaine saw was that of Xander’s hunky roommate Cameron (Adam Huss).
Hooters! is a documentary about the making of Cheryl Dunye’s The Owls, screened last weekend at Outfest.
In Paulista, an actress (Sílvia Lourenço), a lawyer (Maria Clara Spinelli), and an author (Fábio Herford) look for love in the streets of bustling São Paulo.
Elena Undone revolves around the difficult relationship between a pastor’s wife (Necar Zadegan) and a lesbian writer (Traci Dinwiddie). According to filmmaker Nicole Conn, the three-minute-and-twenty-four-second kiss between Zadegan and Dinwiddie is the longest ever in a feature film.
According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the previous recordholder was a liplock between Jane Wyman and Regis Toomey in the 1941 comedy You’re in the Army Now.
(Not that I want to be a smooch spoiler, but according to one website, Devika Rani and Himanshu Rai’s kiss in the 1933 Hindi-language movie Karma lasted all of four minutes.)
Plan B with Manuel Vignau and Lucas Ferraro.
Outfest July 10
Andy Blubaugh’s The Adults in the Room uses “vérité footage and scripted scenes” to show his love affair at age 15 with a man twice his age. Calvin McCarthy plays Blubaugh in the reenactments.
Fernanda Cardoso’s coming-of-age drama Bloomington is centered on a former child star (Sarah Stouffer) who falls for her college professor (Allison McAtee). Complications arise when the actress/student is offered new professional opportunities.
Set on the Bahamian island of Eleuthera, Kareem Mortimer’s Children of God follows a young, white, and suicidal gay man (Johnny Ferro) as meets up with a black gay teacher (Stephen Tyrone Williams) whose family wants him to get married. Also on that island: An anti-gay political activist (Margaret Laurena Kemp) whose former husband is a preacher.
Susan Koch’s documentary The Other City shows a side of Washington D.C. you don’t usually get to see in the news – one in which AIDS plays a devastating role. According to film’s publicity materials, Washington’s rate of HIV infection rivals that of some African nations.
Screening to be followed by a panel discussion featuring Koch and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jose Antonio Vargas, on whose Washington Post stories The Other City is based.
In Marco Berger’s Argentinean romantic-triangle-of-sorts Plan B, a young man (Manuel Vignau) dumped by his girlfriend (Mercedes Quintero) not only befriends the young woman’s new boyfriend (Lucas Ferraro), but also attempts to seduce him.
Dennis Todorovic’s comedy-drama Sasha revolves around the coming out and the coming of age of a young Montenegrin-German (Sascha Kekez) whose beloved piano teacher (Tim Bergmann) is leaving town for good.
Lastly, Glee actress Jane Lynch will be in attendance for a chat about her life and career.
Alicia Silverstone, Clueless.
James Kent’s The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, Amy Heckerling’s 1995 sleeper hit Clueless, Myriam Aziza’s La robe du soir / The Evening Dress, and the comedy shorts compilation “From Uranus to Titicaca” are some of the offerings at Outfest 2010, the 28th edition of the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. The festival is headquartered at the Directors Guild in West Hollywood.
The made-for-British-TV The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister tells the story of a woman who defies 19th-century English conventions to have scandalous affairs with two other women. Maxine Peake stars as Anne Lister. Also in the cast: Anna Madeley, Susan Lynch, Gemma Jones, and Michael Culkin.
In Clueless, a reworking of Jane Austen’s Emma, Alicia Silverstone plays a pampered Beverly Hills high-school student in dire need of a new set of values. Also in the cast: Paul Rudd, Stacey Dash, Brittany Murphy, Dan Hedaya, and Jeremy Sisto.
The Evening Dress features a 12-year-old tomboy (Alba Gaia Bellugi) who falls for her sexy schoolteacher, played by veteran pop singer/actress Lio.
Among the comedy shorts found in “From Uranus to Titicaca” is Lauren Palmigiano, Mike Rose, and Liz Feldman’s A Gaythering Storm, a parody of the National Organization for Marriage’s 2009 anti-gay marriage PSA that features Alicia Silverstone, Lance Bass, Jane Lynch, George Takei, and others.
Julia Kots’ Nothing Happened
More at Outfest 2010 on Saturday, July 11: Rob Williams’ Role/Play, Jake Yuzna’s Open, Joe Wilson’s Out in Silence, and the shorts program “Cherchez la Femme.”
Starring real-life partners Steve Callahan and Matthew Montgomery, Role/Play chronicles the emotional ups and downs of a recently outed soap opera actor (Callahan) and a recently divorced gay marriage activist (Montgomery) who meet at a Palm Springs resort.
Open is described as a movie that “blurs the borders of gender and sexuality.” In the film, two transgender women “alter their bodies to become a single Pandrogynous being,” while a young gay transman dates a “cisgender hipster.”
In the documentary Out in Silence: “The battle for gay rights hits small-town Oil City, Pa. when filmmaker Joe Wilson announces his same-sex marriage in the local newspaper. A woman whose gay teenage son is being abused at school reads the announcement and seeks help from Wilson.”
Among the shorts included in the “Cherchez la Femme” presentation is Julia Kots’ Nothing Happened, in which girlfriends discuss sex, drugs, and dieting tips – but not one particular subject.
Dean Cain, Andrew Keegan, The Broken Hearts Club (bottom)
Monday at Outfest 2010:
Cheryl Dunye’s The Owls is described as a mix of narrative thriller and documentary, featuring a quartet of middle-aged lesbians (Dunye among them) whose lives take a turn for the tragic when they befriend a much younger woman (Deak Evgenikos) who couldn’t care less about older trailblazers.
“OWLs,” the Outfest site explains, is an acronym for “Old Wise Lesbians.” Cheryl Dunye, by the way, is the director of the 1986 cult classic The Watermelon Woman.
Featuring Ben Weber, Dean Cain, Timothy Olyphant, Zach Braff, Matt McGrath, and Andrew Keegan, Greg Berlanti’s 2000 romantic comedy The Broken Hearts Club is set in West Hollywood, a place where boys play with both baseballs and with one another.
Also in the Broken Hearts Club cast: Jennifer Coolidge, Justin Theroux, Nia Long, Mary McCormack, veterans Diane McBain and John Mahoney, and The Twilight Saga: New Moon director Chris Weitz.
“Mastered from the sole surviving 35MM print of director Lino Brocka’s original version, uncut and uncensored,” the 1988 cult classic Macho Dancer will be introduced by Brocka’s nephew, Q. Allan Brocka. The film follows teenage sex workers in Manila’s red light district. (Lino Brocka died in 1991 as a result of a road accident outside of Manila.)
Described as “an unheralded superstar in the American independent gay filmmaking scene,” gay indie actor Matthew Montgomery, among whose credits are Gone, But Not Forgotten, Back Soon, Socket, and Pornography: A Thriller, will be the recipient of the 2010 Artistic Achievement Award for Acting at this year’s Philadelphia QFest, which runs July 8–19.
Montgomery, 32, will be honored at 7:15 on Sat., July 10, at the Ritz East Theater 1. The award presentation will be followed by a screening of Rob Williams’ Role/Play, in which Montgomery costars with his off-screen partner Steve Callahan.
In Role/Play, Callahan plays a soap opera star outed by a gay sex tape scandal. Distraught, he seeks refuge at an exclusive Palm Springs resort, where he meets a (recently divorced) marriage-equality activist (Montgomery).
Additionally, Montgomery is one of the stars of QFest’s closing night film, Robert Gaston’s ensemble suspense drama Flight of the Cardinal. Also in the cast: Ross Beschler, David J. Bonner, Claire Bowerman, and Liz Douglas.
Image: Philadelphia QFest
Frameline, San Francisco’s Gay & Lesbian Film Festival now in its 34th year, will kick off on Thursday, June 17, with a screening of James Kent’s The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, about “what might have happened if Elizabeth Bennet had ignored Mr. Darcy and pursued the local ladies?”
Actually, The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister is not a revamping of a Jane Austen novel. Instead, Jane English’s screenplay follows a young woman attempting to live an authentic “lesbian life” in Regency England. Maxine Peake plays Anne Lister. Others in the film’s cast are: Anna Madeley, Susan Lynch, Gemma Jones, and Michael Culkin.
Attendees at Frameline’s gala opening ceremony will quite possibly be met by picketers protesting the Israeli consulate’s participation as one of the festival’s sponsors.
Frameline 2010 comes to a close on June 27 with a screening of Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman’s Howl, starring James Franco.
notes
Synopses via & more information or to buy tickets at outfest.org.
Images: Outfest
james-franco-howl-outfest-opening-night
the-secret-diaries-of-miss-anne-lister-frameline
matthew-montgomery-flight-of-the-cardinal
matthew-montgomery-gay-indie-actor
matthew-montgomery-gay-indie-actor-jane-austen