Film Categories: body

  • Revolve

    Revolve reimagines the jazz standard “All of Me” to be an assertion of femme for femme desire rather than the self effacing ballad Billie Holiday popularized. Revolve uses the pole as a conduit through time and space to make a love offering to Holiday asking “why not” love and have our full selves loved.

  • Woven Account

    After the artist’s own gaybashing in the Bay Area, they wondered what it would take for their story to make the news. Allegra went on to research reported instances of hate violence targeting LGBTQIA2s+ individuals in the archives of 16 local print and online newspapers. After going through nearly two years of archives – the artist discovered only 33 articles detailing individual hate crimes or stories concerning hate crimes legislation for the broader LGBTQIA2s+ community in the Bay Area. Where they could get their hands on the physical news articles detailing hate crimes, the artist spun that newsprint by hand…

  • A Nice Big Zero for You

    Doughnut destruction that started as a lark but got a bit grim. Also an ode to the JK Optical Printer, and a meditation on human cruelty and expendability.

  • sway / pull

    Created during the COVID-19 pandemic when queer spaces were disappearing across Toronto, sway / pull is a meditation on the erosion of Hanlan’s point beach in both literal and figurative senses. Hanlan’s Point Beach, located on the Toronto Islands, was the site of Toronto first gay pride celebrations in 1970s and remains a queer haven today. Additionally, the Toronto Islands have faced poor city planning that has led to a significant amount of erosion on the beach. This film plays with the concept of erosion by the physical pushing of sand to speak back to the literal erosion of the…

  • The world is blue at its edges

    “What could I tell you about the world I live in?” Addressing her unborn child, the narrator tries to find answers partly through claustrophobic pictures interwoven with intimate notes on a pregnancy in times of a pandemic. Based on a childhood memory, this experimental short film spans from the Cold War Iron Curtain, to the so-called “refugee crisis,” and the renewed closing of borders during COVID-19. Textures of walls closing in blur with pixelated maps, creating a subjective portrait of a new reality and its digital image-world. // “Iris Blauensteiner’s and Christine Moderbacher’s ‘The world is blue at its edges’…

  • The Butch and the Baby Daddy

    Alex (short for Alejandra) has wanted to have a baby almost as long as she can remember. But how is a trans/butch lesbian supposed to get sperm? When she considers asking Mateo, a close gay friend of hers, Alex is forced to investigate what she really values. This frank and funny animated short brings home the challenges, humour, and desire of this bittersweet journey. Based on a memoir by co-director Karleen Pendleton Jiménez.

  • Skin Deep

    Skin Deep leads us into worlds where people are never what they appear to be. It is a riveting psychological drama about obsession, relationship and sexuality. As Alex Koyama prepares to shoot an exploitation film about tattooing and the culture of pleasure and pain, the world around her exists only to serve her film. She initiates a dangerous and threatening game when Chris Black responds to her ad in a tattoo magazine. For Alex, this is living research, and she ignores the fact that Chris is deeply disturbed and gender-disoriented. This denial escalates into a psychological battle between Alex and…

  • Upwards Tide

    A magical lunar reverie filmed over four years on the days and nights of the full moon, this shimmering moving-image poem fluidly combines images of the saltwater Loch Carron in the Scottish Highlands and leafy Viennese forests. The two locations blur and bleed into each other, just as the film itself (shot on gloriously outdated analogue stock) wanders freely among human bodies and bodies of water. Transcendent, transfiguring, transformative. (Neil Young)

  • Arrival 1, Arrival 2

    This experimental essay film springs from the final days of December 2020 when I moved from Chicago to Toronto. The film documents my move and then continues on alternate paths, weaving through the liminal spaces of borders, sickness, interpellation, and dreams. Content Note: This film contains extended discussions about fatphobia and disordered eating. Specifically, this film contains descriptions of food restriction, idealization of thinness, and intense emotional and physical pain after eating. After 11:41 there is no direct discussion of disordered eating. Flashing lights throughout. Loud noises throughout.

  • GANGBANG

    GANGBANG takes place in a bedroom that resembles a gay porn set. Six male models occupy the space, surrounding an empty bed, staring at you. They’re shirtless, wearing blue jeans. We move closer to the group and watch each face dissolve over each other in a series of close-ups. The models never break their seductive smiles, which is all the intimacy they offer. Based on the setup, we anticipate that someone will eventually make the first move. But unlike the stimulating title, GANGBANG denies the viewer of sexual gratification; instead, time freezes – the boys pose together but never make…