Hey folks, Harry here... after the documentary review... which according to Noizangel is pretty good... is a review of a new CANNIBAL flick. Being one of the few practicing Cannibals in the United States, and preparing for the 2nd Annual Cannibal Film Festival at the Alamo Drafthouse this coming week... I will miss it's presence at the festival. Perhaps next year. SIgh.... I hope they take a look at us as we really are... Perhaps they'll talk about the deals with city governments for Transients' bodies... and the fine dishes that are currently served... We are so past the whole ripping the flesh from bones portrayal in most films. We're civilized... there's butchers and chefs and platters with parsley on the side. SOunds like this is a good cannibal film!!!
Hi there -
Lucian said I should do Time and Tide - but I've read the two reviews already up, and all I have to say is - I concur. I found it a shade long, but I had been up since six a.m., and I'm a lightweight sometimes.
This afternoon was doc afternoon, and I couldn't be happier. I love documentaries - I find real life far more absurd and compelling than fiction. So I was really pleased to see both screenings more or less full.
Paragraph 175, so named after the paragraph in the German penal code that criminalized Homosexual activity, was directed by Robert Epstein and Jeffery Friedman, and narrated by Rupert Everett. Unfortunately, the directors couldn't be in attendance, as they are working on a new project.
The film follows Klaus Muller, a historian at the US Holocaust Museum as he tracks down the handful (about 10) of holocaust survivors persecuted because they were gay or lesbian. Muller hadn't heard of the arrest and imprisonment of his "gay grandfathers" when he was growing up, and was amazed that history had forgotten these people. Muller's work led to the eventual inclusion of gays and lesbians in the US Holocaust Museum.
Several survivors - all but two - tell their stories. The first part of the film gives fascinating insights into Weimar Germany, specifically Berlin, and what it was like to be gay at that time. The permissiveness of Berlin, vividly depicted by photos, drawing, and film from the time make it easy to see why the city was considered a "homosexual Eden". The survivor's stories are wonderful, funny stories about gay bars, first meetings, and first loves. This light beginning makes the change in mood all the more effective when Germany begins her shift to Nazism.
The film details the Nazi's condemnation of Homosexuality, from the rise and fall of Rohm, the head of the SA (who also happened to be gay) and the rewriting of Paragraph 175 - which excluded women as they were 'curable', but condemned the accused men to death. Not death by the gas chambers, but by 're-education' - slave labour, experimentation, or castration. 2/3 of the men placed in concentration camps died there. The others, once liberated, were sent to prison, as their preference in partners was still a crime - and remained a crime until the late 1960's. When they returned - one man after almost eight years, their friends and family were gone, and no one wanted to talk about what had happened. Not one of them has been legally recognized as a victim of the Nazis, nor have any of them received any reparations.
Though painful to watch at times, Paragraph 175 is riveting. The survivors tell stories that are unbelievable to most people today. Some speak matter-of-factly, some speak with great anger, some with a quiet calm - but the emotion is plain in their words, and made me cry at least once - Gad Beck's story about dressing as a Hitler Youth to free his "true love" Manfred, is the example that comes to mind.
I think that it is essential viewing - it is part of history that is often forgotten, and should not be, under any circumstances. There's a danger in dismissing it as a 'gay' movie, and though it is about homosexuals, it could as easily be about any group on the fringes of society. Anyone can relate to the people in this film - and though we haven't been through the same experiences - not by a long shot - emotions are universal.
In case you hadn't guessed, I thought it was an excellent documentary, and very sensitively handled. It gives you an excellent feel for the era, and a genuine idea of the terror these people lived in.
Between films, I managed to make an idiot of myself on local TV, and got a Rogers Industry Centre bag for my trouble. Now I look cool and special.;)
Before the second film, Don McKellar's excellent 'prelude' was shown - A Word From The Management. Lucian's comment about no one in their right mind wanting to be a volunteer is interesting - it is a difficult job, but nowhere near as difficult as the job of the theatre reps, or the volunteer office staff. That's why I was so happy to see this short. First, in the words of Homer(Simpson), it's funny 'cause it's true. Second, Don, in the credits, gives a thank you to Bob McCarthy - the Volunteer Coordinator for the Festival. That's *so* nice to see, because Bob deserves all the thanks he can be given.
I met the most wonderful man today. He's funny, charming, honest, and certainly well-travelled. His name is Tobias Scheenbaum, he's in his seventies, and I met him in a film called Keep the River on Your Right: A Modern Cannibal Story.
David and Laurie Gwen Shapiro (a brother/sister team) directed, and we were fortunate enough to have David, Laurie, and Tobias around to answer questions afterward.
Keep the River on Your Right follows Tobias as he returns to two places: Asmat, in Papua/New Guinea, where he lived with the people for quite a few years, and to Peru, which he first visited on a grant when he was a painter. Not only does the film follow him on his journey, but it also explains the life of this rather remarkable man along the way. A painter/archaeologist/author, Tobias's first trip to Peru brought him in contact with a tribe that took the unwitting man with them to raid another tribe. Afterwards, they did cannibalize their enemies, and he did take part. But that's not really the main thrust of the film - despite the title. Tobias has never really dealt with what happened there, and the film and the filmmakers push him to do so.
What makes this film such a joy to watch is Tobias himself, who is relentlessly honest, but very charming, and in one of his friend's words - a chameleon. He manages to fit in wherever he goes. He's remarkably accepting of himself, and his life - he says, at one point, that as he gets older, he understands more about his life. Something to hope for, I suppose.
There are several excellent moments in the film, particularly Tobias's reunion with an ex-lover in Asmat. As he waves good bye, and calls 'I love you', Tobias looks so conflicted, it almost hurts you to watch it. The Shapiros did several really interesting things - they have a really odd sense of humour, which I like. They open with Tobias shopping for food while the credits are shown over the scene, and often focus on lines like "Let's have dinner soon". They also have captured a very interesting scene which I think adequately shows the ignorance of some western tourists while in eastern countries.
In the Q and A afterward, Tobias said, "I've always been queer, in every meaning of the word." It's very true. And that's what makes him an incredibly fascinating person to watch. And if he can hack through a jungle in his seventies, it sure as hell gives us all something to shoot for.
Later...
