In both amateur and professional sports, being gay remains taboo. Few dare to come out of the closet for fear of being stigmatized, and for many, the pressure to perform is compounded by a further strain: whether or not to affirm their sexual identity. Standing on the Line takes a fresh and often moving look at some of our gay athletes, who share their experiences with the camera. They’ve set out to overcome prejudice in the hopes of changing things for the athletes of tomorrow.
Until 1982, when homosexuality was decriminalized, homosexuals were caricatured, insulted and even condemned. They had to live hidden from the gaze of others and create their own spaces of freedom: balls, the night and especially art. Artists have contributed to making homosexuals visible, first through words, then through images, and finally by investing popular culture.
This compelling and thought-provoking documentary provides riveting portraits of a diverse group of six men who once were women and chose to change their gender. The award-winning film is an unforgettable story of self-discovery and challenges all of us to re-examine the foundations of our ideas and feelings about gender, sexuality, and identity.
Just a generation ago, it was adults, not kids, who changed genders. But today, many children are transitioning, too—with new medical options, and at younger and younger ages. Told from the perspective of parents, doctors, and, most revealing of all, the kids themselves, the documentary takes a powerful look at this new generation, exploring the medical possibilities, struggles and choices transgender kids and their families face today.
Documentary about the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2014 Conchita Wurst – on the day before the live transmission of the Eurovision Song Contest 2015 from the Wiener Stadthalle.
Described in the 70’s as "A Chorus Line for gay people," Crimes Against Nature remains vital today as a communal disclosure of roles that gay people adopt in order to survive in a world that devalues homosexual feelings. It features individual actors delivering revealing monologues, during which the other members of the collective play background roles (parents, schoolmates, etc.). One by one, the actors detail the ways in which they have buried their true selves in order to survive and be accepted in the world: repression, drug use, shyness, being agreeable, putting experiences into "little boxes," acting "butch," and so on.
The film follows the story of Jamie, a struggling butch lesbian actress who gets cast as a man in a film. The main plot is a romantic comedy between Jamie's male alter-ego, "Male Jamie," and Jill, a heterosexual woman on set. The film's subplots include Jamie's bisexual roommate Lola and her cat actor Howard, Lola's abrasive butch German girlfriend Andi, and Jamie's gay Asian friend David.
An intimate look at the human faces of America's current opioid epidemic. Seen through the eyes of a mother and the lens of a small town.
A young group of actors are preparing an updated version of Shakespeare's ROMEO & JULIET. Two boys perform the central roles - both of them struggling with their own questions of love alongside their roles on stage. And as rehearsals begin, reality soon starts to interfere with the play.
Many geneticists and archaeologists have long surmised that human life began in Africa. Dr. Spencer Wells, one of a group of scientists studying the origin of human life, offers evidence and theories to support such a thesis in this PBS special. He claims that Africa was populated by only a few thousand people that some deserted their homeland in a conquest that has resulted in global domination.
Personal diary-style documentary of German Gay rights activist Von Praunheim's sojourn in the US.
Documentary on the growth of Toronto's gay community including positive developments as well as the infamous "Operation Soap" where the Toronto Police raided gay bath houses, and the subsequent protests.
a film exploring the ins and outs of queer love and how it relates to bisexuality on a spectrum.
In this film from late in his career, Kramer returns to Hanoi after nearly 25 years to re-envision the city’s struggle through an uncertain and daunting past, present, and future. The Vietnamese characters in the film are diverse: Kramer’s former guide from an earlier visit in 1969; a tight-rope walker in the national circus; a man who took photos of B-52s and another who lost his fingers shooting them down.
This feature length documentary explores the queer side of gaming culture and the game industry's LGBTQ presence. The GaymerX convention that took place in 2013 was a huge step forward for the queer geek community being recognized on a worldwide industry scale. In the same year, more popular mainstream and indie games featured a greater amount of gay and lesbian characters than ever before, helping with visibility and acceptance. The video games universe will only continue to improve and diversify both in its community and industry if we elevate the conversation about inclusion and respecting one another - not in spite of our gay geekiness, but because of it!
When Sarah accidentally proposes to her girlfriend in Provincetown, the mixup turns their loving relationship into a minefield of marital exploration.
Haram
In this film, Laerte conjugates the body in the feminine, and scrutinizes concepts and prejudices. Not in search of an identity, but in search of un-identities. Laerte creates and sends creatures to face reality in the fictional world of comic strips as a vanguard of the self. And, on the streets, the one who becomes the fiction of a real character. Laerte, of all the bodies, and of none, complicates all binaries. In following Laerte, this documentary chooses to clothe the nudity beyond the skin we inhabit.
A chronological look at films by, for, or about gays and lesbians in the United States, from 1947 to 2005, Kenneth Anger's "Fireworks" to "Brokeback Mountain". Talking heads, anchored by critic and scholar B. Ruby Rich, are interspersed with an advancing timeline and with clips from two dozen films. The narrative groups the pictures around various firsts, movements, and triumphs: experimental films, indie films, sex on screen, outlaw culture and bad guys, lesbian lovers, films about AIDS and dying, emergence of romantic comedy, transgender films, films about diversity and various cultures, documentaries and then mainstream Hollywood drama. What might come next?
A documentary about stories of personal transformation and healing through yoga in the Queer, Trans, QTPOC communities from the lens of decolonizing yoga.