Another Wave: Global Queer Cinema, Part One
July 5–21, 2006

Another Wave: Global Queer Cinema brings together a broad palette of international queer cinema produced since the late 1980s. Though North America and Western Europe are often recognized for their prolific output of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender film and media, a wide range of works from sub-Saharan Africa, India, New Zealand, Thailand, Argentina, Bolivia, Mexico, Israel, and China is less often made available. While the globalization, if not homogenization, of film narrative and form takes further hold on the public imagination and the film industry in general, international queer filmmakers continue to test the possibilities of film and media aesthetics. More important, this new wave of queer filmmakers investigates cinematic form in relation to the complexities of their sexual identities and the world in which they live. This is the first part of a two-part series that concludes in September.

Organized by Charles Silver, Associate Curator, Department of Film and Media; David A. Gerstner, Associate Professor, CUNY, College of Staten Island, and author of Manly Arts (Duke University, 2006); Jim Hubbard, filmmaker, curator, and archivist; and Thomas Beard, Program Director, Ocularis.

Special thanks to Mahen Bonetti, Ann Butler, V. J. Carbone, S. Leo Chiang, Tom Chomont, Nelson Gonzalez, Stephen Kent Jusick, Abina Manning, Ralph McKay, Olivia Newman, Brent Phillips, William Phuan, Cordelia Swann, Dorothy Thigpen, Basil Tsiokos, Debra Zimmerman; and for the loan of prints, First-Run Features Sneak Preview Entertainment, Strand Releasing, Zeitgeist, Miramax, New Zealand Film Commission, and the individual artists.

See a schedule of screenings in Another Wave: Global Queer Cinema, Part Two

He Liu (The River). 1997. Taiwan. Directed by Tsai Ming-Liang. A young man shares an urban apartment with his parents, drifting through life without a job, but everything changes when he develops a chronic ailment. The River is a metaphysical meditation on the anomie of modern urban life. In Mandarin, English subtitles. 118 min.
Wednesday, July 5, 6:00; July 8, 2:00. T2

Young Soul Rebels. 1991. Great Britain. Directed by Isaac Julien. With Valentine Nonyela, Mo Sesay. “Identity is the crisis, can’t you see?” Set in 1977, during the week of the Queen’s Silver Jubilee, Julien’s first feature represents the British front of the New Queer Cinema and provides a searing portrait of pre-Thatcher cultural politics. 101 min.
Wednesday, July 5, 8:30; Saturday July 8, 4:30. T2

Bugis Street. 1995. Singapore. Directed by Yonfan. With Hiep Thi Le, Michael Lam. Sixteen-year-old Lien moves to Singapore during the 1960s and unwittingly finds a room in a hotel populated by transsexual prostitutes. Here she experiences a whole new world of sensuality, seduction, beauty, and dignity. 105 min.
Thursday, July 6, 6:00 (introduced by Yonfan); Sunday, July 9, 5:30. T2

Twilight of the Gods. 1995. New Zealand. Directed by Stewart Main. With Greg Mayor, Marton Csokas. Despite the differences in language and culture, two warring protagonists in nineteenth-century New Zealand develop a strong love and passion for each other. In English and Maori, English subtitles. 15 min.
Desperate Remedies. 1993. New Zealand. Directed by Stewart Main, Peter Wells. With Jennifer Ward-Lealand, Lisa Chappell. The breathtaking opening shot invites the spectator into an operatic vision of the historical British Empire. Unlike other New Zealand films, the directors resist the “natural” landscape often reserved for hetero-traditional histories. 93 min.
A Taste of Kiwi. 1991. New Zealand. Directed by Peter Wells. Rugby is presented as a homoeroticized spectacle through a montage of matches, locker rooms, and gay pornography. 2 min. Program 110 min.
Thursday, July 6, 8:30; Saturday, July 8, 7:30. T2

Pangyau. 2002. Malaysia. Directed by Amir Muhammad. A film set in Kuala Lumpur’s lively Chinatown, in which memories of a teenage friendship provide the point of departure for extended meditations on race, sex, desire, and difference. In Malay and Cantonese, English subtitles. 13 min.
Dakan. 1997. Guinea. Directed by Mohamed Camara. Considered one of the first sub-Saharan African films to deal with homosexuality, Dakan tells the tale of two young men’s search for sexual identity in a place where no language exists to explore their love. In French and Mandikan, English subtitles. 87 min.
Friday, July 7, 6:00; Sunday, July 9, 1:30. T2

The Bridge. 2005. Australia. Directed by George Barbakadze. Produced by Lazaro Hernandez. 8 min.

Head On. 1998. Australia. Directed by Ana Kokkinos. With Alex Dimitriades, Paul Capsis. Kokkinos’s feature debut dramatically and uncompromisingly follows Ari, a young and handsome Greek Australian, in his troubled relationship with his immigrant family and his many queer sexual encounters. Ari confronts the complex and interwoven dynamics of masculinity, sexual identity, and diasporic culture. 104 min.
Friday, July 7, 8:00 (introduced by Barbakadze and Hernandez); Saturday, July 15, 4:30. T2

Lan Yu. 2001. Hong Kong. Directed by Stanley Kwan. With Hu Jun, Liu Ye. Shot entirely underground guerilla-style on location in China, Lan Yu is based on the controversial, anonymously published Internet novel Beijing Story. Kwan’s film explores the anxieties of sexual desire in a tumultuous world of political and cultural change. In Mandarin, English subtitles. 87 min.
Sunday, July 9, 3:30; Friday, July 14, 6:00. T2

Water Drops on Burning Rocks. 2000. France. Directed by François Ozon. In this highly stylized version of R. W. Fassbinder’s unproduced play, a fifty-year-old’s 1970s bachelor pad serves as the backdrop for ruthless seduction, unrequited love, and ambiguous (and sometimes painful) desire. In French, English subtitles. 85 min.
Prince of Peace. 1993. Austria. Directed by Hans Scheugl. The pornographic imagination of a men’s bathroom and one very memorable tattoo. 8 min.
Monday, July 10, 6:00; Thursday, July 13, 8:00. T2

Good Boys. 2005. Israel. Directed by Yair Hochner. With Daniel Efrat, Yuval Raz, Danni Lachman. Seventeen-year-old Meni loves the cinema, the most fashionable clothes, and the hottest music—and works as a rent boy. He’s the father of a child with Mika, a young, drug-addicted prostitute, and his adoptive mother is a transgender prostitute. When he meets Tal, another hustler, one night, the story that unfolds is one of waiting and hoping. In Hebrew, English subtitles. 75 min. This film contains nudity and strong sexual content.
Monday, July 10, 8:00 (introduced by Hochner, Lachman); Sunday, July 16, 5:30. T2

Ximena Cuevas: Videoworks. 1998–2005. Mexico. One of Mexico’s most renowned video artists, Cuevas casts a trenchant eye on daily melodramas through a unique blend of autoportraiture and cultural detritus. Included in this program is Cuevas’s complete fin-de-siècle cycle Dormimundo, as well as a selection of recent titles. In Spanish, English subtitles. 66 min.
Wednesday, July 12, 8:15; Thursday, July 20, 6:00. T2

Tropical Malady. 2004. Thailand. Directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul. With Banlop Lomnoi, Sakda Kaewbuadee. This simple love story of two young men is told on two different narrative planes, utilizing a stunning formal and aesthetic structure. The first part of the film follows a linear narrative. The second unfolds through dream, myth, and legend, where human and animal conjoin. In Thai, English subtitles. 118 min.
Saturday, July 15, 6:45; Friday, July 21, 8:00. T2