Tag Archives: LGBTIQ+

Women Who Kill (2016)

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The closing night Melbourne Queer Film Festival film had me the moment I saw it starred Sheila Vand (A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night). It is writer, director and star, Ingrid Jungermann, though who steals the show. This is a comedy, albeit a dark one. Morgan (Jungermann) and Jean (Ann Carr) host a regular podcast called ‘Women Who Kill’ about female serial killers. They are exes who seem like an old married couple; they bicker and banter until Morgan meets the mysterious Simone (Vand) at the food co-op she volunteers for.  Continue reading →

Below Her Mouth (2016)

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Another Melbourne Queer Film Festival screening and with a title like that you know it’s going to be a raunchy lesbian film. There were two queues snaking down the stairs at ACMI and I could tell at a glance that the all male one was not the one I needed. The first of two sold out sessions, my expectations were high. Sigh. Below Her Mouth is everything that Lovesong isn’t.  Continue reading →

Lovesong (2016)

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Image via MIFF

Lovesong is one of the films I missed at MIFF and the Melbourne Queer Film Festival has given me another chance to see it. It won’t be to everyone’s taste but I loved this sparse, quiet tale of the significant loves we have in our lives and what steers our choices. Continue reading →

Paris 05.59: Théo and Hugo (2016)

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Image via MIFF

This Melbourne Queer Film Festival screening was my third attempt to see this film; booked at MIFF but sacrificed for tiredness, waiting for half an hour at Cinema Nova yesterday before it was cancelled due to a technical hitch and then rescheduled today. I’m glad I hung in there; it was a beautiful film that pulled me into a world both foreign and familiar.  Continue reading →

The Handmaiden (2016)

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This Korean adaptation by Chan-wook Park of the novel Fingersmith by Sarah Waters was a delightful surprise. Skipped at MIFF because it seemed a bit trivial, I discovered it is a beautiful exploration of the power of women and the many guises of oppression and truth. Continue reading →

Don’t Call Me Son (2016)

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DONT-CALL-ME-SON-3Lovely, lovely. This Brazilian film reminded me a little of Sebastian Silva’s work (The Maid MIFF 2015). Pierre and his sister Jacqueline live with their mother, Aracy. Pierre plays in a band and behind closed doors puts on lipstick and dresses, finding connection with girls and boys alike. But then the police arrive and it seems his mother is not his mother, he was stolen as a baby and now must forge a new life with a new family. Continue reading →

The Danish Girl (2015)

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Oh goodness me. Another film inspired by a true story. This one couldn’t be more different from The Revenant in style and sensibility, although I reckon it might also be playing to the Academy Award crowd. Eddie Redmayne plays Einar Wegener, a Danish artist in the 1920s who was the first publicly-known person to undergo gender reassignment when he became Lili Elbe. The Danish Girl focuses on him/her and Gerda, Einar’s wife and fellow artist. The story is…nice, palatable, inoffensive. Transgender packaged up neatly for a heterosexual world. Continue reading →

Sworn Virgin (Vergine giurata) (2015)

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Sworn Virgin is another of those multinational coproductions but I’m going to call it an Albanian film. The thread of the story is about gender roles in rural Albania, and although it is set equally in Italy, it is Albanian life and culture that we experience. The story is set in two time periods, we see Mark traveling from Albania to Italy and reuniting with his sister and her family after 14 years. We can tell that Mark is actually a woman and we know that Lila, his sister, knows but everyone else is oblivious. We then flash back to Lila and Mark’s teenage years in Albania and we discover the story. Continue reading →