GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE

SECTION B

APRIL 8, 1994

Evenings Out

From real-life

to reel-life

The Cleveland International Film Festival

The HIV positive members of Team New York Aquatics, as seen in Living Proof: HIV and the Pursuit of Happiness, a film by Kermit Cole

by Charlton Harper

Got a hankering for a film about orphan sibling incest and don't know where to go to quench it? Or how about a movie that explores the eccentric genius of pianist Glenn Gould? Maybe you'd like something with a tap-dancing cow? From April 7-17 you can find all of that and more at the 18th Cleveland International Film Festival.

The festival continues to explore a broad range of world cinema through several series that include documentaries, family films, shorts, performance art on film and new films from eastern Europe. For lesbian and gay filmgoers, the focus of the Festival will be the "10 Percent Cinema" series, a special favorite with CIFF Executive Director David Wittkowsky. The series offers four full length features and an evening of four shorts. "Ten Percent is back and that's significant," says Wittkowsky. "We had funding last year for 10 Percent from the Ohio Arts Council. This year we have no specific funding for the series, but the strong support of the board enables us to bring it back.”

The series underscores the driving issues behind contemporary gay life. Here, like the rest of the festival itself, there's something for everyone. Gays in the military, the AIDS community, and attempts to convert queers into "real people" are just a few of the current events explored by these films. The only thing missing is a film by a lesbian director, a lack that disappoints Wittkowsky. "It's very frustrating trying to find lesbian films," he says. "There are so few lesbian filmmakers. I screened a wonderful new film called Go Fish by a lesbian filmmaker from Chicago. I really wanted to book it for the festival, but Samuel Goldwyn snatched it up right away and is planning it for general release sometime in the fall."

Two stand-out films in the series are Grief, directed by Richard Glatzer, and Coming Out Under Fire, a documentary by Arthur Dong that focuses on the real-life military adventures of lesbians and gay men during World War II.

Coming Out Under Fire is filled with irony. Several men and women who served in the war are interviewed today, recounting their own personal wartime queer-survival stories. There's the obvious hypocrisy that here these people served capably and proudly, in spite of military ban. But subtler ironies about existence gradually surface. One lesbian tells how she and another female soldier were poster-girls for the Army propaganda machine, while being lovers at the same time. A male soldier reminisces about camping it up in drag for company shows and musicals. Photos illustrate his story with images of

"women" sitting on soldiers' laps, laughing and hugging. Beyond the irony, the film is filled with a quiet honesty that even the bigoted Joint Chiefs of Staff would find hard to ignore.

Richard Glatzer's Grief can trace its influences to the films of John Waters and bad daytime television. It's an ensemble piece that follows five days in the lives of the wacky production crew of a bizarre low-budget TV show, “The Love Judge," inspired by Glatzer's real-life experience as producer of Divorce Court. Mark is still trying to recover from the death of his lover while also nursing a crush on Bill the straight boy. Jo, the producer, is planning on marrying and moving to Prague, which leaves Mark and cowriter Paula to compete for her job. Then there's the nagging mystery of the semen stains that appear on Jo's couch.

Though the sound quality is poor, nothing else about this film is second rate. The boys are cute and the acting is great. Look for a dominating Jackie Beat as Jo. She fills every scene with me, me, me. Sort of like Divine with a regular day job.

Also check out Living Proof: HIV and the Pursuit of Happiness. Knowing "It's dangerous to focus an HIV film in just a gay category," Wittkowsky has wisely placed this film in the Documentary series. For once we get a film about HIV that is completely affirming and positive, and not just centered on the gay community. It's a film that goes a long way at putting faces behind the hysteria and lies.

For some of Wittkowsky's picks from the general fare, look for The Cement Garden (a hot British film about sibling incest); Desperate Remedies (a campy melodrama set to the music of Verdi, Berlioz and Strauss); Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould (Gould's life refracted through Bach's 32-part Goldberg Variations); Rebels of the Neon God (a Taiwanese film about disenfranchised youth); and The World's Best Commercials 1993. In addition to the tap-dancing cow, you also get Pope John Paul II hawking Tango Orange Soda, Charles Barkley versus Godzilla for Nike, and some crash-test dummies from Volkswagen.

For information about ticket prices and screening times call 349-FILM (3456). All films will be shown at Hoyts Cinemas at Tower City. Beginning April 8, tickets may be purchased in the Hoyts lobby.