HOMO SUPERIOR
by James Hannaham
New York Gay And Lesbian Film Festival
reprinted from the Village Voice, 06/05/01
New York Though the 13th annual New York Gay and Lesbian Film
Festival opens with the high-profile Hedwig and the Angry Inch,
the documentary Bombay Eunuch tells an even more complicated story
of cross-dressing and castration. In fact, the most engrossing films in
our sampling of the features offered this year aren't strictly "gay"—neither
saccharine coming-out stories nor righteous documentaries about two-spirit
earth mothers. Instead, we get a visit with South African hairdressers,
an art film from India about a pair of wrestling train guards, and a sci-fi
parody made by a male feminist.
Through Bombay resident Deppa Krishnan, Bombay Eunuch directors
Alexandra Shiva, Sean MacDonald, and Michelle Gukovsky enter the closed
world of "hijras." Low status forces them into abject poverty
and sex work, but Indian culture grants them some mythology. Their blessings
and curses, it is said, come true. Meena, the queen of the "hijras,"
undercuts the portrait's potential as an academic freak show by demanding
a daily fee from the filmmakers. The project's intentions are compromised
in a way that turns the whole enterprise into a culture-clashing circus;
the payoff, which arrives from outside the frame of the documentary, is
ironic and beautiful.
Paulo Alberton and Graeme Reid's Dark and Lovely, Soft and Free
seems too simply intentioned to go off track. But if you're traversing
South Africa to interview hairdressers in the townships, there's plenty
of opportunity for unexpected adventure. Alberton and Reid's van breaks
down; they go to remote areas where subjects decide not to talk. But the
innocence of their mission transforms the documentary into a funny and
touching evocation of post-apartheid life; the remarkably blasé
hairdressers they do contact have found ways to weave themselves into
a turbulent society.
The slatternly Southwesterners of Todd Hughes's The New Women
go on a frantic road trip too. All the men in the world have suddenly
fallen asleep, and it's up to the ladies to reinvent society. The theme
is ham-fisted, Stepford Wives-style male feminism—one doubts
the elimination of men would create chaos so complete. But this cheapo
black-and-white B movie's witty, trash-talking script bursts at the seams
with loopy satire and ballsey female characters, led by Mary Woronov and
Sandra Kinder, who could bring the house down reading road signs.
Balaram and Nimai, the rural Indian train guards in The Wrestlers,
live by reading signs—train signs mostly, but also subtext. The two,
like a live-action Akbar and Jeff, share everything, especially an enthusiasm
for Greco-Roman wrestling. Buddhadeb Dasgupta's slow-paced slice-of-life
starts moving midway through, when Balaram suddenly brings home a wife
(not to mention charming performances by Shankar Chakraborty and Tapas
Pal. Like the rest of this fare, The Wrestlers expands the homo
horizon by making its gay theme subtle and contextual, instead of trying
to make gender and sexual orientation the whole story.
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