BFF FILM & FESTIVAL BLOG
What We Loved About Sundance
Written by Katerina Plescia
Still from The Janes courtesy of Sundance Institute
After their first virtual viewing experience, the 45th annual Sundance Film Festival commenced on January 20, 2022, in a hybrid form. Over the eleven-day celebration, artists presented their films through various online programs.
With the looming pressures of the Omicron variant and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the Sundance artists persevered to uphold the importance of gathering as a community. Regardless of the circumstances, the Sundance Film Festival reminded audiences that in these tough times, viewers should continue to come together and celebrate what the artists have to offer.
The Festival brought out a conglomeration of fantastic and culturally significant films. Each submission offered a glance into a variety of social and cultural lifestyles.
Filmmakers Tia Lessen and Emma Pildes premiered their documentary, The Janes, at the festival, enthralling audiences with a story of women who organized nearly 11,000 affordable illegal abortions in Chicago, IL prior to the passage of Roe v. Wade. While the documentary was impressive and educational for those unfamiliar with the situation, the film did not add anything new to the conversation. The revolution was primarily set in the late 1960s, however, bringing the story into the modern era would have granted it the potential missing element.
The film Midwives centered around the relationship between Muslims and Buddhists in Myanmar. Setting aside military differences, a Buddhist woman, Hla, and Nyo Nyo, a Muslim woman, worked together to treat Muslim patients. Sundance newcomer Snow Hnin Ei Hlaing’s feature debut was incredibly insightful, providing audiences with a close-up glance into the relations between Muslim Rohingya of Myanmar and Buddhists of Myanmar.
Still from Midwives courtesy of Sundance Institute
Reid Davenport’s experimental documentary, I Didn’t See You There, approached the viewpoint of a wheelchair user from a new perspective. Although Davenport is never seen on the big screen, the film consists of hand-held point-of-view shots, placing audience members in the shoes of a wheelchair user in America.
The 2022 celebration of the Sundance Film Festival lifted the spirits of community members and continued to spread their message of support to independent artists. The festival was packed with a total of 85 features, 59 short films, and much more. Filled with enlightening interviews, thoughtful conversations, and groundbreaking films, the Sundance Film Festival of 2022 has us on the edge of our seats waiting for next year.
Katerina is a junior at Pace University in Pleasantville, NY. After graduation, she aspires to work as an entertainment journalist, centering her writing around music, film, and the arts. She grew up in Bethel, NY and is a dog mom to a Pitbull rescue, Maddie. Find more of her work on her website or Instagram.
2021 Hot Docs Festival: Celebration of LGBTQ+ Cinema
The 2021 Hot Docs Festival (April 29th through May 9th) recently hosted a Celebration of LGBTQ+ Cinema, an online social event honoring the filmmakers whose work was featured at this year’s festival. Here are a few of the poignant documentaries Aubrey Benmark had the opportunity to view.
Written by Aubrey Benmark
Photo Credit: Fae Pictures
“International Dawn Chorus Day”
Director: John Greyson
Running Time: 16 minutes
Country: Canada
Year: 2021
Taking place on the first Sunday of May, International Dawn Chorus Day is a worldwide celebration inspiring people across the globe to rise with the sun and enjoy birdsong. The film cleverly adapts the event into a Zoom meeting full of birds cooing and cawing, dividing the screen into several video feeds depicting various landscapes from around the world. In contrast to the auspicious occasion, the birds speculate over the recent death of Egyptian activist/filmmaker Shady Habash, who died in a Cairo prison after years of detention as a political prisoner. In 2018, Habash produced the music video Balaha with artist Ramy Essam, criticizing Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi, the president of Egypt. The birds also lament over the death of Sarah Hegazi, a woman who was arrested in 2017 for flying a rainbow flag at an Egyptian concert, then was beaten and tortured for three months. Hegazi moved to Toronto in 2018 as a political refugee, but was unable to recover from her trauma and committed suicide a month after Shady Habash’s death. The gallery view of the birds’ Zoom call is interspersed with images of Sarah Hegazi, Shady Habash, and several other political prisoners facing injustice at the hands of Al-Sisi’s regime.
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Marlene Dietrich in 1975 Source: AP Photo
“Mad About Marlene” (Rough Cut)
Director: Vera Iwerebor
Running Time: 59 minutes
Country: Netherlands
Year: 2021
The film delves into the personal life and career of world-renowned star Marlene Dietrich, as seen through the eyes of six of her greatest fans— all older gay gentlemen. From 1959 to 1975, Dietrich toured the world with her one-woman show and left an indelible mark on a generation. Through interviews, the men discuss their love for the icon and share their extensive collections of photos, records, films, magazines, and article cut-outs, among many other Dietrich memorabilia, that have enhanced their lives throughout the years. One fan produces and performs in drag shows inspired by Dietrich, striving for perfection in every aspect, constantly asking himself, “How would Marlene do this?” Another fan makes life-like dolls of Dietrich and has travelled the world exhibiting his work. Two of the men visit Deutsche Kinemathek, a prominent German film archive that purchased Marlene’s collection of costumes, keepsakes, and other personal effects, including letters from family and lovers, after her death in 1993. As a gay icon, Marlene Dietrich enriched the lives of these men, offering them a source of strength while grappling with their own identities.
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Photo Credit: Prospektor
“Girlsboysmix”
Directors: Lara Aerts & Els van Driel
Running Time: 7 minutes
Country: Netherlands
Year: 2020
The film follows nine-year-old Wen Long, a child born intersex (formerly referred to as hermaphroditism, the presence of both male and female reproductive tissue in a person). She was adopted as a toddler and moved to the Netherlands after being left on a roadside in China. Pictures reveal the younger Wen dressed and styled as a little boy, although she currently has long hair and wears more feminine clothing. Rather than force Wen to receive a ‘corrective’ surgery she might later regret, her adopted parents provide much-needed support to their child’s identity, believing she should be the one to make decisions about her body when she is much older. Wen talks about the boys who bully her in school. One of them told her, “You’re not a boy, you’re not a girl, so you’re nothing at all,” but the precocious Wen has a different attitude.
“Intersex people decide if they are a boy or a girl. They don’t have to but they can,” she said.
Wen goes on a field trip to a sheep farm with a few of her friends. The children playfully make guesses over which sheep are rams (boys) or ewes (girls) until the sheepherder introduces them to a freemartin, an intersex sheep. Wen wishes “that everyone would know what intersex is so she doesn’t have to explain it.” Like any child, Wen only wants to be herself. The film is a cheerful portrait of a young person innocently confronting the inadequacies of the gender binary.
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Photo credit: National Film Board of Canada
“Into Light”
Director: Sheona McDonald
Running Time: 20 minutes
Country: Canada
Year: 2021
Set in Yellowknife, Canada, the film revolves around a mother’s journey to accept her child’s gender transition. To protect their privacy, the faces and identities of the pair aren’t revealed, a real and honest concern having already faced discrimination in their small community. During the beginning of her interview, when asked to talk about her child in the past tense as a boy, the mother struggles, not wanting to go against her child’s wishes. The transition began during pre-school when the mother took her son shopping to buy an outfit for the Christmas pageant. He eagerly picked out a sparkly silver dress and immediately put it on when they returned home. It was the first time the mother saw confidence in her child. As her son, he was always grumpy and scared; he often hid behind her legs and refused to interact with others. As the months went on, her son told her, “You know I’m really a girl,” and asked for different pronouns. As her daughter, with longer hair and prettier clothes, the child became social and excited to participate in life despite the bullying she faced at school. At age 5, she received a new birth certificate and health card with the correct gender markers. People they knew started to avoid them. The mother feared the hateful things others would say or do, but realized it was easier for the child to be ridiculed than to live in a way that was inauthentic. McDonald shot the film amidst a snowy backdrop, with scenes of the two playing in a massive snow castle juxtaposed with wide shots of the austere winter landscape, illustrating the bond between mother and daughter in a world where transgender children are far from being accepted.
