Author Topic: NEW FEST: 20th Anniversary NY LGB&T Film Festival: "Were the World Mine" (2008)  (Read 37478 times)

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Were the World Mine  (2008)


Review Summary

An outcast in his town's homophobic community, Timothy's spirit soars when his eccentric teacher casts him in A Midsummer Night's Dream. After discovering a love potion, Timothy puckishly begins to turn his closed-minded town gay. He soon commands the love he desires and deserves. But once he reluctantly returns the towns free will, negating the potion, he is surprised by what remains. ~


IMDb:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0476991/

If you had a love-potion, who would you make fall madly in love with you? Timothy, prone to escaping his dismal high school reality through dazzling musical daydreams, gets to answer that question in a very real way. After his eccentric teacher casts him as Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream, he stumbles upon a recipe hidden within the script to create the play's magical, purple love-pansy. Armed with the pansy, Timothy's fading spirit soars as he puckishly imposes a new reality by turning much of his narrow-minded town gay, beginning with the rugby-jock of his dreams. Ensnaring family, friends and enemies in this heart-wrenching chaos, Timothy forces them to walk a mile in his musical shoes. The course of true love never did run smooth, but by the end of this moving musical comedy of errors based on director Tom Gustafson's prolific award-winning short film, Fairies, the bumpy ride comes to a heartfelt conclusion. With vibrant imagery, a first-rate ensemble cast and innovative music rivaling the best of pop/rock and contemporary Broadway, Were the World Mine attempts to push modern gay cinema and musical film beyond expectation.



http://www.indiewire.com/movies/2007/11/production_repo_20.html

"Were The World Mine"

Director Tom Gustafson adapts his short, "Fairies," into his feature debut. Using Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" as inspiration, this comedy/musical follows a high school boy's discovery which leads to his uptight hometown becoming more open-minded.

After screening "Fairies" at 75 film festivals (including Tribeca in '04), Gustafson was still into the story and decided to expand it with the help of Shakespeare. "We went to the text of 'Midsummer' to figure out where we could pull lines of text to help create the story that we were trying to tell at that point," Gustafson says. "It's pretty amazing that we have a musical that's all original besides the Shakespeare text, which is public domain. It's really freeing, you don't have to go and track down a bunch of artists for the rights."

In the film the main character Timothy (Tanner Cohen) has the part of Puck in the school production of "Midsummer," but as the lead up to opening night grows closer, Timothy finds a potion -- similar to the one Puck has in "Midsummer" -- that makes people fall in love and uses it to make the most unlikely people (particularly same sex) fall in love with each other. The musical numbers (lyrics directly from "A Midsummer Night's Dream") are then incorporated through Timothy's daydreams.

To find financing Gustafson spent a year trying to interest the Broadway community, but after being promised the world by some only to find they could provide nothing, he decided to make the film with the little money he had, shooting it in Chicago last June. But looking back, Gustafson believes using the short as a launching pad for the feature made the whole process less daunting. "It's still scary as hell," he says, "but it was already an interesting story, and we could show the short to perspective financiers, instead of starting something completely brand new."

Produced by Gustafson, Peter Sterling and Cory Krueckeberg (who also co-wrote the film with Gustafson and was the production designer), the film was shot on Super 16 by D.P. Kira Kelly. The film is currently being edited by Jennifer Lilly. Executive producers are Reid Williams and Jon Sechrist.


Florida Film Festival
2008  Won Audience Award Best Feature
Best Narrative Feature
Thomas Gustafson

 Nashville Film Festival
2008  Won Best LGBT Film
Thomas Gustafson
Best Music in a Feature Film
Jessica Fogle
Cory James Krueckeberg
Tim Sandusky

Torino International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival
2008  Won Audience Award Feature Film
Thomas Gustafson  

« Last Edit: February 18, 2012, 12:35:00 pm by Aloysius J. Gleek »
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Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Offline southendmd

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Thanks for that, John.

It's also playing at the Provincetown film festival in two weeks and I'm going!

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Were the World Mine
A Musical Dream Come True


"If you could make someone love you, would you?"

Click here and scroll to get the video trailer:
http://www.afterelton.com/blog/snicks/delirious-musical-were-the-world-mine-to-close-NY-LGBT-film-festival




http://www.newfest.org/cgi-bin/iowa/index.html



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Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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What a beautiful night! Jenny (newyearsday) took me to the most wonderful film, and we met a new friend, Don Bachardy, the star of this amazing documentary.

I hope you will have a chance to see this--it's just incredible!



The Trailer:
http://www.zeitgeistfilms.com/chris&don/


Chris & Don: a love story

(USA, 2007, 90 mins)
Directed By: Guido Santi, Tina Mascara

When 18-year-old Don Bachardy was introduced to 49-year-old Christopher Isherwood in 1950s Malibu, neither man knew it would be the start of a love story that would last for 30 years.

Chris & Don chronicles their years together, with the vibrant and engaging Don at this extraordinary documentary’s epicenter. Don, a UCLA student with artistic talents, became the ideal companion for Isherwood, the celebrated British writer best known for his Berlin Stories.

Despite their age difference, a relationship blossomed, and Don soon moved in with Chris. Growing up in the LA suburbs enamored with Hollywood, Don had crashed premieres to take photos with celebrities. With Chris, he suddenly found himself hobnobbing with all manner of luminaries from the arts and literary scene, such as WH Auden, Igor Stravinsky, and Tennessee Williams.

Encouraged by Chris, Don developed his artistic ambitions in art school and eventually found his own fame as a painter, with Chris as his regular model. Open about their relationship at a time when homosexuality wasn’t discussed in polite conversation, Chris and Don weathered the various storms resulting from their different ages, classes, and backgrounds, and remained together until Chris’ death in 1986.

Combining interviews with Don, Chris’ personal journal entries, rare home movies, and archival footage, Guido Santi and Tina Mascara have crafted a very personal story, best demonstrated through the charming animated sequences depicting the horse and cat alter-egos the couple doodled on their personal letters over the years. Chris & Don is a touching, illuminating portrait of the enduring power of love.



A sleeper hit at the Telluride Film Festival, CHRIS & DON: A LOVE STORY is the true-life story of the passionate three-decade relationship between British writer Christopher Isherwood (whose Berlin Stories was the basis for all incarnations of the much-beloved Cabaret) and American portrait painter Don Bachardy, thirty years his junior. From Isherwood’s Kit-Kat-Club years in Weimar-era Germany (the inspiration for his most famous work) to the couple’s first meeting on the sun-kissed beaches of 1950s Malibu, their against-all-odds saga is brought to dazzling life by a treasure trove of multimedia. Bachardy’s contemporary reminiscences (in the Santa Monica home he shared with Isherwood until his death in 1986) artfully interact with archival footage, rare home movies (with glimpses of glitterati pals W.H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky and Tennessee Williams), reenactments, and, most sweetly, whimsical animations based on the cat-and-horse cartoons the pair used in their personal correspondence. With Isherwood’s status as an out-and-proud gay maverick, and Bachardy’s eventual artistic triumph away from the considerable shadow of his life partner, CHRIS & DON: A LOVE STORY is above all a joyful celebration of a most extraordinary couple.

CHRIS & DON will open on June 13 2008 at New York's Quad Cinema, 34 West 13th Street, (212) 255-8800

"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
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Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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"Need some gay pride?  Check this out: star-crossed lovers faced with the insurmountable odds of being out in the 1950s, with a 30-year age difference, and living in the scrutinizing public spotlight, give convention the middle finger to bask in the purity of a love lasting three decades.

And it’s a true story."



Don Bachardy and Christopher Isherwood in the early ’50s.



Don Bachardy and Christopher Isherwood sitting in front of a portrait of themselves painted by David Hockney (late ’70s).







For large format images of the thumbnails above, go to:

http://www.zeitgeistfilms.com/film.php?directoryname=chrisanddon&mode=downloads
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
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Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Chris & Don: a love story

New York Starts June 13
Huntington Starts June 13
Fort Lauderdale Starts June 27

Los Angeles July 4-July 11
Berkeley July 18-July 25
San Francisco July 18-July 25

Boston July 18-July 24
Philadelphia July 23-August 1
Chicago Starts July 25
Minneapolis July 25-August 1

San Diego July 25-August 1
Washington, DC July 25-July 31

Atlanta August 1-August 7
Kansas City Starts August 1
Seattle August 1-August 7
St. Louis August 1-August 8

Columbus, OH September 18
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Offline Shakesthecoffecan

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It's also playing at the Provincetown film festival in two weeks and I'm going!


And so will I, we'll have to see if this one is still available.
"It was only you in my life, and it will always be only you, Jack, I swear."

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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http://nymag.com/movies/reviews/47836/

From New York Magazine:

Christopher Isherwood’s true love

By David Edelstein
Published Jun 13, 2008

Guido Santi and Tina Mascara’s documentary Chris & Don tells the story of a gay English blue blood who in the fifties picked up a working-class stud muffin 30 years his junior on a Santa Monica beach and became obsessed with him. Primed as we are by a culture rich in both homophobia and dirty old men, we can be forgiven for anticipating a sordid cautionary tale. It’s a shock—a happy shock—when Chris & Don recounts a love that approaches the transcendental.

Chris is Christopher Isherwood, famous for Berlin Stories—which was the basis of Cabaret and inspires in Chris & Don an unfortunate tangent about how wrong Isherwood thought Liza Minnelli was for Sally Bowles. Don is Don Bachardy, an unsophisticated Californian given to movie-star worship—and most impressed, at first, by Isherwood’s acquaintance with Montgomery Clift. Eyebrows are raised when they move in together.

But a fascinating thread emerges in interviews with friends and in excerpts from Isherwood’s diary—read via the magic of movies by Michael York, who played the author’s alter ego in Cabaret. Chris’s ideal love would have to be someone outside his class, who wouldn’t remind him of everything he fled (going as far, you’ll recall, as Weimar). And in Don he recognized a fellow artist—albeit one with vastly different gifts. The young man evolved into a marvelous portrait painter, with an eye for the detail that turns a likeness into an X-ray.

Isherwood passed away in 1986, but Bachardy still lives in the house they shared and still paints attractive young men in stages of undress. He speaks in an English accent that is distinctly Isherwood’s. The creepiness dissipates the more you get to know him. After Bachardy became successful in his own right, he and Isherwood had periods of estrangement, took lovers, and pushed the limits of domesticity. But he was there at Isherwood’s deathbed, drawing him compulsively, then drawing his body for hours after his passing.

The sequence, like the movie, is stunningly open and heartfelt. We look at those final drawings of Isherwood and sense what Bachardy is doing: capturing surface details in a feverish attempt to go beyond them—to get to the core of his lover’s being. Chris & Don is the rarest of documentaries: a realistic portrait of the human spirit.


« Last Edit: June 13, 2008, 09:43:09 pm by jmmgallagher »
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Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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http://www.villagevoice.com/film/0824,opposites-attract,464862,20.html

From The Village Voice:

Opposites Attract in Chris & Don
Portrait of the artist as a young man (and his lover as an old one)

by ERNEST HARDY
June 10th, 2008 12:00 AM


Chris and Don

With a glint in his eye and a grin on his lips, artist Don Bachardy looks into the camera and explains the dynamic of his three-decade relationship with the late literary icon Christopher Isherwood as if it were a fairy tale.

"His role," says Bachardy, "could be described as that of the arch villain. He took this young boy and he warped him to his mold. He taught him all kinds of wicked things." Pause a half beat. "It was exactly what the boy wanted. And we flourished."

With his elegant cadence, crisp comedic timing, and witty flipping of homophobic stereotypes—in his very choice and use of language—Bachardy is that story come to life: the student who eventually mirrored his teacher, the molded who became a duplicate of the mold.

Chris & Don: A Love Story is a charming, illuminating portrait of the complex and storied queer romance between Isherwood and Bachardy, who met on a Santa Monica beach in 1952, when Bachardy was a teenager and Isherwood already 30 years his senior.

Quilted from black-and-white home-movie clips, animated sequences that bring to life the duo's correspondence and pet names, and original footage of the elderly Bachardy going about his daily routine or walking through the art-filled Santa Monica home he once shared with his partner, Tina Mascara and Guido Santi's film uses standard documentary-filmmaking tools to celebrate three entities—Isherwood, Bachardy, and their relationship—that flaunted all the rules.

Individually, the men are fascinating in their own right, and Mascara and Santi flesh out their backstories in rich detail: Isherwood's aristocratic upbringing and his break from it—though his background forever influenced every aspect of his being—and his life in Berlin, which became the basis for some of his most celebrated work (The Berlin Stories); Bachardy's conservative, homophobic family life, and the electric-shock treatments that permanently debilitated his queer older brother.

But it's the relationship and life that the men forged together that are most extraordinary. Their cosmopolitan circle (glamorous and influential friends included Elsa Lanchester, W.H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky, Aldous Huxley, and Bertrand Russell) was at the center of a bygone era of both hyper-literate high culture and outsider chic.

The terms on which the couple set up house not only reach back to the most ancient manifestations of queer coupling (the older man taking a younger partner under his wing, schooling him on life, culture, and sex), but also illustrate lingering issues with—or even within—the modern gay and lesbian community.

Theirs was an organic, constantly evolving companionship. They quite consciously shaped it, but also allowed it to find its own patterns and path. There was extraordinary vulnerability in their union ("Don might leave me," Isherwood is quoted as saying, "but I could never leave him. Not unless he ceased to need me"), only matched by extraordinary faith in their bond.

The relationship contained elements of the parent/child hierarchy (with the roles flip-flopping back and forth over time), but it was also an erotic quest that expanded to include other lovers—especially as Bachardy matured into his own man—and then retreated back to monogamous form again, at least emotionally. And as Bachardy grew into his own creativity, theirs became a conversation between artists, too. With the most delicate of hands, directors Mascara and Santi shape their investigative film into the revelation that all of this constituted Chris and Don's love story.

The recent California Supreme Court ruling overturning the ban on gay marriage brings gays, lesbians, and same-sex relationships one crucial step closer to legitimacy in the eyes of the law—a legitimacy that was unimaginable when our two heroes first met in the '50s. But as confetti and champagne toasts greet the news, it might be a good thing for gays and straights to glean some lessons from Isherwood and Bachardy's example: Make your own rules, set your own terms for connection, and be willing to let them evolve as you and your partner hopefully do.



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Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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http://www.gaycitynews.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=19769249&BRD=2729&PAG=461&dept_id=569331&rfi=6

Gentlemen In Love


Don Bachardy and Christopher Isherwood pose
in front of a painting of themselves by David Hockney.

By: GARY M. KRAMER
06/12/2008

CHRIS & DON: A LOVE STORY
Directed by Tina Mascara and Guido Santi
Zeitgeist Films
Opens Jun. 13
Quad Cinema

"Chris & Don: A Love Story" documents the 30-year relationship between writer Christopher Isherwood and his partner Don Bachardy, who was 30 years his junior.

Isherwood, born near Manchester, England, was a prolific writer over a 40-year span and a close friend of both W.H. Auden and Stephen Spender, but is probably best known for the opening words of his 1939 novel "Goodbye to Berlin" - "I am a camera," which was the title of a stage adaptation of his novel that eventually became the musical "Cabaret."

Bachardy became a respected painter and pencil portrait-maker.

"Chris & Don," which incorporates Isherwood's diaries, home movies, photographs, and interviews, as well as Bachardy's scrapbooks, drawings, and paintings, is an intimate and affectionate portrait of the men who lived together in California from 1953 until Isherwood's death in 1986. During the early years of that relationship, it was still quite daring to be an openly gay couple.


One essential bond between the two men - whose love is adoringly depicted via animated sequences involving a surrogate horse and a cat - is the house they shared in Santa Monica. The small hillside ranch is lined with books and artwork on every wall - David Hockney collages and Duane Michaels photographs, as well as plentiful portraits of nude men. The garage was converted to an atelier for Bachardy.

A distinguished gentleman, whose British accent is something he "mimicked" from Isherwood, Bachardy opens the door of his home and is dressed almost entirely in blue. His wiry frame is draped in a blue linen shirt, and his jeans are held up by a blue leather belt. Even his socks, which sport yellow dollar signs on them, are blue.

An interview with the artist begins with Bachardy explaining how he was approached to be in the documentary.

"I did it just as a favor to Guido [Santi, the co-director]," he says, adding that he never believed the film would actually happen.

"Because I liked the filmmakers and I was at ease with them, I was much more candid than I would have been with any filmmaker I didn't know well," Bachardy says, almost wistfully. "The older I get the more my life becomes like an open book. I used to be much more private, and much less forthcoming, but it matters much less the older I get, and why keep things from people?"

Almost as if to prove his point, the artist launches into a randy story comparing Isherwood's penis with that a handsome man named Alex - and recounts his sexual experiences with the two of them.

But Bachardy's stories are not all naughty. Bachardy describes how he met Isherwood and talks about their life together as well as his own experiences since his lover's death. He also talks with considerable animation about the famous people he's painted over the years - Bette Davis, whom the movie-mad Bachardy worshipped in his youth, actress Teri Garr, costumer Edith Head, and California Governor Jerry Brown, for whom he was commissioned to paint the official portrait that hangs in the state capitol building.

Bachardy and Isherwood ran in a famous crowd - posing for Hockney and smoking hashish with Paul Bowles. But this high life might not have been possible for Bachardy had he not met Isherwood, and the artist acknowledges this.

"I've had an insanely lucky life," he says.

When pressed about his "luck," and what may account for being in the right place at the right time, or knowing the right people, he demurs: "Luck is luck. I can't tell you that I deserved it more than anybody else."

One of the most poignant episodes in "Chris & Don" recounts the story of Bachardy painting Isherwood as he was dying.

"It wasn't death Chris was afraid of, but dying," Bachardy recalls. "His dying was something we were doing together."

Painting Isherwood, he explains, was a way to be with him as much as possible during the experience.

"We had already established the habit of sittings," Bachardy explains. "He was my first live sitter. It was his suggestion that he offered himself to me as a subject."

The paintings, seen in the film, are among the artist's best. The canvas Bachardy painted of his lover is seen in a visit to the atelier, and it is masterful. Isherwood sports a blue shirt painted in such a way that makes his soulful visage seem to float. It is a haunting, beautifully realized work.

The artwork and books that surround him in his home are constant, almost nagging reminders of Isherwood, but Bachardy enjoys having them everywhere.

"What a wonderful thing to be reminded of [Chris]," he says. "This house is packed with memories. He is very much with me still. I cultivate his presence. It is a very essential part of my life. Whenever I need encouragement, and strength, I think about him - I can't despair."

Bachardy says that making "Chris & Don" was more enjoyable and therapeutic than cathartic or painful. The film is a joyous celebration of a life lived and shared by two men passionately in love.

"Chris was a mentor and guide," Bachardy says. "Of all the gifts he gave me, to find and follow my vocation was the greatest."
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


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Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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http://www.salon.com/ent/critics_picks/2008/06/21/june21/



"Chris & Don: A Love Story"



English writer Christopher Isherwood and American painter Don Bachardy were a Los Angeles power couple decades before anyone had ever said "gay" and "marriage" in the same sentence -- unless they meant a tipsy hetero pair -- but the documentary "Chris & Don: A Love Story" is much more than an illustration that, hey, homos can have real relationships. Isherwood was already a middle-aged famous writer (author of "The Berlin Stories") when he met the much younger Bachardy on Santa Monica Beach in 1952, and in the succeeding years the duo both embodied stereotypes about homosexual love -- theirs was something of a master-pupil relationship, and not altogether monogamous -- and uprooted them. Direction by Tina Mascara and Guido Santi is straightforward, but this appealing mixture of home movies, contemporary interviews and animation captures the spirit of a pioneering sexual, personal and artistic partnership and the remarkable literary-artistic circle -- Aldous Huxley, Bertrand Russell and Igor Stravinsky were among their friends -- that nurtured it. (Now playing in New York and Rochester, N.Y. Opens July 4 in Los Angeles; July 18 in Boston and San Francisco; July 25 in Chicago, Lake Worth, Fla., Minneapolis, Philadelphia, San Diego, Washington and Wilmington, Del.; and Aug. 1 in Atlanta, St. Louis and Seattle, with more cities to follow.)

-- Andrew O'Hehir
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
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Offline southendmd

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Thank you, John.  Because of  your posts, I exchanged tickets at the Ptown film festival in order to see Chris & Don.  I've always enjoyed the documentaries they show, and this was easily the best film we saw this week. 

Also, Were the World Mine was very charming.  The filmmakers were present, and expect distribution in the fall. 

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Paul, I'm so glad--thanks to Jenny (newyearsday), I was not only able to see Chris & Don in New York, but to meet Don himself at a party afterwards--and I learned that Don is adorable, a real cutie, beautiful inside and out!

Unfortunately, I was later unable to go to the last night of the NY LGB&T Film Festival and I missed Were the World Mine. A very good friend suddenly decided to hold a black tie birthday (Geebus Christu!!!) for another friend, and I could not, in good conscience, go. Other than that, I would have been at the NY premiere--I was SO looking forward to WtWM--oh well, it's GOT to come up soon! Fingers crossed!

I'm glad you and Truman had a good time at the Festival!

Thanks,

John
 :)


John and Friend (Ha! Am I his accessory or is he mine?)
« Last Edit: June 23, 2008, 12:25:23 am by jmmgallagher »
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Gasp! You met Don? Tell us more!!

"chewing gum and duct tape"

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Geebus Christu, John, you look fantastique!  :-*

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Elle, you are too kind--

I remember the Sondheim lyric (A Little Night Music, the opening song 'Now,'):

My body's all right--
But not in perspective
And not in the light--


But thanks!

 ;D
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
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Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Gasp! You met Don? Tell us more!!

Yes!

Well, again, thanks to Jenny (newyearsday), we went to the screening for Chris & Don at the New York LGB&T Film Festival on June 7th. Two the producers first introduced the film, then the producers came back out afterwards with Don Bachardy himself, and the crowded theater stood and cheered, a very emotional standing ovation.

Don spoke for quite a while--he's very articulate and drily funny--and then the program coordinator said 'We need the theater back--but if you want to meet Don up close, join us for a party in Don's honor at Plumm (246 West 14th Street between 7th and 8th).' Jenny and I looked at each other and we said "Like, duh--yeah!'

So. We went, hung around, then Don and the entourage walked in, and Jenny and I just zoomed over. Boom, we pounced! We found Don to be delightful, and I finally told him what I had been thinking during his Q&A talk earlier: 'You're beautiful inside and out,' a dumb, but utterly heartfelt thing, and that was it! Jenny and I left as anything else would be too anticlimactical, so we went to Florent on Gaansevort Street (as it is closing June 29)--just a wonderful evening!

If you have a chance to see the movie Chris & Don, go--you won't regret it!

"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


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and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
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Offline Shakesthecoffecan

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I enjoyed Chris and Don very much, but I thik the timing of Were The World Mine, really drove it home for me.

If you get a chance to see these films, please do so.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EC_Q44P8_m4[/youtube]

Similar:

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7IOlfTcFf4&feature=related[/youtube]

And an interview:

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ao-5d0C2bM&feature=related[/youtube]
"It was only you in my life, and it will always be only you, Jack, I swear."

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #19 on: November 20, 2008, 11:11:42 am »

Yay! At long last!





Coming Soon
Starts on 11/21/2008

WERE THE WORLD MINE -  (unrated)
2008 - USA - English - 95 minutes - Logo
Directed by: Tom Gustafson
Featuring: Tanner Cohen, Wendy Robie, Judy McLane, Nathaniel David Becker




If you had a love-potion, who would you make fall madly in love with you? Timothy, prone to escaping his dismal high school reality through dazzling musical daydreams, gets to answer that question in a very real way. After his eccentric teacher casts him as Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream, he stumbles upon a recipe hidden within the script to create the play's magical, purple love-pansy. Armed with the pansy, Timothy's fading spirit soars as he puckishly imposes a new reality by turning much of his narrow-minded town gay, beginning with the rugby-jock of his dreams. Ensnaring family, friends and enemies in this heart-wrenching chaos, Timothy forces them to walk a mile in his musical shoes. The course of true love never did run smooth, but by the end of this moving musical comedy of errors based on director Tom Gustafson's prolific award-winning short film, Fairies, the bumpy ride comes to a heartfelt conclusion. With vibrant imagery, a first-rate ensemble cast and innovative music rivaling the best of pop/ rock and contemporary Broadway, WERE THE WORLD MINE attempts to push modern gay cinema and musical film beyond expectation.

"Critic's Pick - Must See!"
--New York Magazine

"Surpasses in quality almost any competition film from Sundance this year."
--Indiewire.com

"The musical numbers are inventively choreographed and energetically performed...a rousing, warm-hearted spectacle."
--Stephen Farber, The Hollywood Reporter
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline southendmd

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #20 on: November 20, 2008, 03:40:46 pm »
Here's a link to opening dates, cities and theatres for Were the World Mine:


http://speakproductions.com/WTWM_Theatrical_Dates.html




Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #21 on: November 21, 2008, 11:15:09 pm »

I saw Were the World Mine--it's adorable! Sadly, the 7:00pm show tonight--with a Q&A with the director and actors--was sold out. But I did see the 5:00 show--it was winsome, it was luscious--just a treat! See it if you can!



http://movies.nytimes.com/2008/11/21/movies/21were.html?8dpc

Movie Review
Were the World Mine (2008)

NYT Critics' Pick
(This movie has been designated a Critic's Pick by the film reviewers of The Times.)



Tanner Cohen, right (I corrected the NYT's mistake here!), and Nathaniel David Becker in
“Were the World Mine,” inspired by “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

November 21, 2008
Puck’s Love Potion, Splashed Across Town

By STEPHEN HOLDEN
Published: November 21, 2008


What teenager hasn’t fantasized about wielding magic to transform an indifferent object of desire into a besotted lover? In “Were the World Mine,”  an indie alternative to Disney’s “High School Musical”   franchise, Timothy (Tanner Cohen), a persecuted gay student at a private boys’ school outside Chicago, acquires such magic while rehearsing the role of Puck in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

When a purple flower spurting Cupid’s love juice mysteriously springs up in Titania’s bower, Timothy plucks it and later tosses its liquid into the eyes of his secret crush, Jonathon (Nathaniel David Becker), the ostensibly straight star of the rugby team. Mutual puppy love is instantaneous and intense.

In Timothy/Puck’s prankish scheme, every helpless target of such magic falls madly in love with the first person in sight, inappropriate or not. And for the next 24 hours Timothy dashes around his small town making unsuspecting homophobes, including the rugby coach, fall ridiculously in love with dumbfounded members of the same sex; before long, the streets are crawling with cow-eyed, spooning gay couples.

This small, endearing film, directed by Tom Gustafson from a screenplay he wrote with Cory James Krueckeberg, has already won a number of awards, including outstanding narrative feature at Outfest, the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. In its giddiness, “Were the World Mine”  echoes “High School Musical 3”  right down to featuring balletic choreography on a basketball court.

With original music by Jessica Fogle, and lyrics (some original and others adapted from Shakespeare) by Mr. Krueckeberg, it is an enchanting, mildly subversive fantasia that reconciles sassy teenage argot with Elizabethan. One moment it is this, the next that. Ms. Fogle’s most striking music, especially the title song, sets Shakespearean dialogue in an ethereal Minimalist style that has the entranced intensity of centuries-old sacred music.

The movie doesn’t burst into song all that often. Some numbers are no more than clever asides, played on guitar and sung by Timothy’s sullen friend Frankie (Zelda Williams, daughter of Robin), a self-possessed tomboy who describes herself as “hetero-flexible.” Frankie morosely takes it in stride when Timothy experiments with the love juice on Max (Ricky Goldman), his best friend and her crush.

A subplot involves Timothy’s embattled relationship with his divorced mother, Donna (Judy McLane), who is having difficulty coming to terms with his sexuality. Donna takes a job as a door-to-door saleswoman for the cosmetics line invented by Nora (Jill Larson), the vain, bigoted wife of the school’s stuffy headmaster (David Darlow).

To some degree, Donna and Nora are John Waters-style female caricatures. So is the film’s mysteriously powerful guardian angel, Ms. Tebbit (Wendy Robie), the airy, arty English teacher who casts the Shakespeare production, oversees rehearsals and refuses to shut it down after the town goes erotically bonkers.

Ms. Robie, who bears a strong resemblance to Patricia Clarkson, plays the teacher as a benign sorceress who wears a secretive smile while using “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”  to impart some lessons in tolerance. In what is shown of the final production, the gawky high school boys playing both men’s and women’s roles have turned into graceful actors comfortable with Elizabethan English.

“Were the World Mine”  begins tentatively, but once its tone is established, its charm overcomes the inevitable weaknesses of a musical made on a stringent budget. Like its Disney counterparts, it operates on the assumption that the movie musical is a world unto itself in which ordinary rules of logic don’t apply. One thing doesn’t have to lead to another, and not everything need be explained. Movie-musical magic makes up the difference.

WERE THE WORLD MINE

Opens on Friday in New York, San Francisco and Berkeley, Calif.

Directed by Tom Gustafson; written by Cory James Krueckeberg and Mr. Gustafson; director of photography, Kira Kelly; edited by Jennifer Lilly; music by Jessica Fogle, adapted and original lyrics by Mr. Krueckeberg; choreography by Todd Underwood; production designer, Mr. Krueckeberg; produced by Mr. Gustafson, Mr. Krueckeberg and Peter Sterling; released by Speak Productions. In Manhattan at Cinema Village, 22 East 12th Street, Greenwich Village. Running time: 1 hour 36 minutes. This film is not rated.

WITH: Tanner Cohen (Timothy), Wendy Robie (Ms. Tebbit), Judy McLane (Donna), Zelda Williams (Frankie), Jill Larson (Nora Bellinger), Ricky Goldman (Max), David Darlow (Lawrence Bellinger) and Nathaniel David Becker (Jonathon).
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline southendmd

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #22 on: November 22, 2008, 12:52:02 pm »
"Winsome and luscious"--you said it, John!

Thanks for the review, and I look forward to seeing it again when it comes to Boston in two weeks.

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #23 on: November 22, 2008, 03:55:09 pm »

"Winsome and luscious"--you said it, John!

Thanks for the review, and I look forward to seeing it again when it comes to Boston in two weeks.

Thanks for your continuing support re this terrific little film, Paul--it deserves it!

I must also add:

Cory James Krueckeberg: I had never heard of him before, and he is the (co-)writer, lyricist, one of the (co-)producers AND the production designer--wow, what a quadruple-threat! I have not seen such a playful, stylish, affectionately knowing, and gol-darned attractive film, visually, since Diva, high praise from me indeed!

Zelda Williams (as Frankie), Robin Williams's daughter: small part, but--that girl is going to be big. HUGE. I can feel it.

Tanner Cohen: good actor, beautiful voice, like a boy chorister. Sweet!

Nathaniel David Becker: not a brilliant actor or singer, tiny, but--WOOF! Mr. Krueckeberg, as production designer, knew what to do with Mr. Becker--took away his shirt! Yum!

There are so many films I want to see during the holidays--but I'll be seeing Were the World Mine again, for sure!
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline southendmd

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #24 on: December 05, 2008, 10:08:46 pm »
Hey John, I just saw Were the World Mind again tonight, as it opened in Boston.

It's still winsome and luscious.  I liked it better the second time even.

I thought I caught something new:  there was a part where I thought Timothy was going to use the magic pansy to try to get his parents back together.  It looked to me as if they contemplated this (the split had been alluded to), but decided against it, as it would spoil the "gay thing".   

Anyway, the Midsummer Night's Dream thing was wonderful:  such an accessible play to high school students of any time. 

You're right, John, the production looked marvelous.

BTW, Mr. Gustafson and Mr. Kreuckenberg presented the film at the Provincetown film festival.  Boy, it's so hard to get these little indie gems shown.  Good luck to them. 

Offline southendmd

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #25 on: December 06, 2008, 10:53:44 pm »
Boston critics are so stereotypically harsh!  Here's the Globe's review:


'World' has a gay old time with Shakespeare
Ty Burr, Globe Staff

A cross between "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and a gay remake of "High School Musical"? Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show. Well, wonder on while we try to make heads or tails of the swoony, sweethearted train-wreck that is "Were the World Mine." There are times when it is safe to say that a labor of love is love's labor lost, and, reader, this is one of them.


WERE THE WORLD MINE
Directed by: Tom Gustafson

Written by: Gustafson and Cory James Krueckeberg

Starring: Tanner Cohen, Wendy Robie, Nathaniel David Becker, Judy McLane, Zelda Williams

At: Kendall Square

Running time: 95 minutes

Unrated (language, sexuality, gay rugby musical numbers)


The film is a feature-length outgrowth of the 2003 short "Fairies," written by Cory James Krueckeberg and filmed by Tom Gustafson, a Hollywood casting director making his bid to be a force in queer cinema. "Were the World Mine" is nothing if not ambitious. It's the execution that falters.

Set in a tony prep school, the film centers on Timothy (Tanner Cohen), a barely-closeted day student with the singing voice of an angel. Bullied in dodgeball and tolerated by his blue-collar mother (Judy McLane), Timothy pines for the school's king jock, Jonathan (Nathaniel David Becker), drifting into Busby Berkeley-style daydreams in which the two act out their love.

But soft - what plot device through yonder window breaks? The school's drama teacher (Wendy Robie), an enchantress of sorts herself, casts Timothy as Puck in an all-male version of "Midsummer Night's Dream," and in studying his lines he deciphers a hidden recipe for love-juice, just like the one in the Shakespeare play. No sooner has he wielded his passion flower (it's purple and it spurts) on the eyes of his classmates, then each falls for the first person he sees. Soon the entire rugby team is paired off, the coach has declared his love for the principal, and Timothy and Jonathan are officially an item.

What keeps "Were the World Mine" from soaring into the delirious forbidden zone to which it aspires isn't the filming, which is low-budget and clumsy but fully felt, especially in the musical numbers. The culprits, instead, are the script (the dialogue comes in two flavors: Shakespeare and halting), the characters (gay or straight, they're all two-dimensional) and the performances. The soap actress Jill Larson plays the principal's snooty wife as a strident homophobic cartoon; when someone who has survived two decades of "One Life to Live" can't breathe life into her lines, you know a film is in trouble.

Hollywood royalty alert: Robin Williams's daughter, Zelda Williams, plays the hero's best friend, an alt-guitarist type, and she's one of the few people here who seems visibly comfortable in front of a camera. Cohen does too, but only when he sings. A headlong fantasy of gay teen openness and independent filmmaking, "Were the World Mine" requires serious indulgence. You're forgiven if you choose to indulge it, though. Like the man said, "If we offend, it is with our good will."


http://www.boston.com/ae/movies/articles/2008/12/05/world_has_a_gay_old_time_with_shakespeare/

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #26 on: December 06, 2008, 11:02:07 pm »
Have you seen this, John?  The trailer for the short "Fairies" from 2003, the inspiration for "Were the World Mine".  Interestingly, also stars Wendy Robie, albeit with shorter hair.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvcOeRnMb5A[/youtube]

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #27 on: December 06, 2008, 11:08:02 pm »
Dang! Sometimes I wish I could live where you are! But then I'd miss the splendor of the Rocky Mountains. What a choice!!
 :-\
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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #28 on: December 06, 2008, 11:44:55 pm »
Here's another review from the San Francisco Chronicle:

Movie review: 'Were the World Mine'
Reyhan Harmanci, Chronicle Staff Writer

Friday, November 21, 2008


Were the World Mine: Musical. Directed by Tom Gustafson. Starring Tanner Cohen and Wendy Robie. (Not rated. 95 minutes. At the Opera Plaza in San Francisco and the Shattuck in Berkeley. )
 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The phenomenon of teen musicals - beloved by actual teens - is a little perplexing. There is just nothing ... cool ... about breaking into song and dance routines in daily life. Disney's "High School Musical" juggernaut and the popularity of the stage show and film version of "Hairspray" have brought more attention to the teen-centered Broadway hit "Spring Awakening," which will be made into a film as well.

"Were the World Mine" follows the teen musical formula but renders its material with admirable lushness and intelligence. It was a hit as an indie short film on the film festival circuit before director and writer Tom Gustafson turned it into a full-length musical, so irony and self-referral humor are written into its DNA.

"Were the World Mine" tells the story of out gay teenager Timothy (Tanner Cohen), who is attending a boys' private school. He is hazed repeatedly and ruthlessly by his homophobic classmates, but he survives by escaping into fantasy (here come the musical sequences) - mostly, fantasizing about the extremely cute Jonathon (Nathaniel David Becker). He also has to deal with his struggling mother (Judy McLane) and friends Frankie (Zelda Williams, daughter of Robin) and Max (Ricky Goldman).

Life changes abruptly for Timothy when, after being cast as Puck in the school production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" by his slightly batty drama teacher (played by "Twin Peaks" actress Wendy Robie), he finds a secret recipe embedded in Shakespeare's famous farce. Timothy, like Puck, has the ability to make people fall in love with the first person they see. Should he use it?

Well, it wouldn't be much of a movie if he didn't. As the action unfolds, with dazzling color and crisp choreography, the homophobic boys get the lesson of their lives.

The weakest part of the movie, besides some rather drawn-out plot machinations, is the musical aspect. The tunes just aren't catchy enough to linger or clever enough to stand in for dialogue. It's a welcome addition to the cavalcade of teen-focused musicals, but like a midsummer night's dream, can hardly be remembered the next day.

-- Advisory: Boys kiss boys often in this film, but nothing truly shocking.


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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #29 on: December 06, 2008, 11:51:41 pm »
Merci beaucoup:

Let's make the world ours: gay for all humans !![/b]

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #30 on: December 07, 2008, 03:10:36 am »

Have you seen this, John?  The trailer for the short "Fairies" from 2003, the inspiration for "Were the World Mine".  Interestingly, also stars Wendy Robie, albeit with shorter hair.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvcOeRnMb5A[/youtube]

PAUL! Thank you for this--now I am desperate to see 'Fairies' forthwith!

Best ever: Wendy Robie has literally the Last Word: Luscious!

Yes!
« Last Edit: December 07, 2008, 09:06:50 am by jmmgallagher »
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #31 on: December 07, 2008, 03:35:37 am »


-- Advisory: Boys kiss boys often in this film, but nothing truly shocking.


My advice to the Advisory: Boys should kiss boys often--period!
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #32 on: December 09, 2008, 12:39:05 pm »

Not totally left field--these two music videos are from songs featured in Were the World Mine



Mika - Relax Take It Easy (3:47)
[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Be6jlCuMvVQ[/youtube]



Patrick Wolf - The Magic Position (4:04)
[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMrWcjKzajk[/youtube]



If Youtube does not allow you to see Patrick Wolf - The Magic Position embeded, click on
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMrWcjKzajk
and see it directly on YouTube.

(Mr. Wolf really seems to have a Were the World Mine kind of aesthetic, don't you think?)
« Last Edit: December 09, 2008, 07:21:24 pm by jmmgallagher »
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #33 on: December 24, 2008, 04:16:00 pm »
Hey John, I just saw Were the World Mind again tonight, as it opened in Boston.

It's still winsome and luscious.  I liked it better the second time even.

I thought I caught something new:  there was a part where I thought Timothy was going to use the magic pansy to try to get his parents back together.  It looked to me as if they contemplated this (the split had been alluded to), but decided against it, as it would spoil the "gay thing".   

Anyway, the Midsummer Night's Dream thing was wonderful:  such an accessible play to high school students of any time. 

You're right, John, the production looked marvelous.

BTW, Mr. Gustafson and Mr. Kreuckenberg presented the film at the Provincetown film festival.  Boy, it's so hard to get these little indie gems shown.  Good luck to them. 

I am going to see this on Dec 26 in Denver with my friend Offline Chuck!! Thanks for your recommendation (and Tru's!!)
"chewing gum and duct tape"

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Re: NEW FEST: The 20th Anniversary New York LGB&T Film Festival: Great Movies!
« Reply #34 on: December 24, 2008, 05:28:02 pm »
I am going to see this on Dec 26 in Denver with my friend Offline Chuck!! Thanks for your recommendation (and Tru's!!)

I hope you love it, FRiend!  Report back with your thoughts.

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http://www.salon.com/ent/critics_picks/2008/06/21/june21/



"Chris & Don: A Love Story"



English writer Christopher Isherwood and American painter Don Bachardy were a Los Angeles power couple decades before anyone had ever said "gay" and "marriage" in the same sentence -- unless they meant a tipsy hetero pair -- but the documentary "Chris & Don: A Love Story" is much more than an illustration that, hey, homos can have real relationships. Isherwood was already a middle-aged famous writer (author of "The Berlin Stories") when he met the much younger Bachardy on Santa Monica Beach in 1952, and in the succeeding years the duo both embodied stereotypes about homosexual love -- theirs was something of a master-pupil relationship, and not altogether monogamous -- and uprooted them. Direction by Tina Mascara and Guido Santi is straightforward, but this appealing mixture of home movies, contemporary interviews and animation captures the spirit of a pioneering sexual, personal and artistic partnership and the remarkable literary-artistic circle -- Aldous Huxley, Bertrand Russell and Igor Stravinsky were among their friends -- that nurtured it. (Now playing in New York and Rochester, N.Y. Opens July 4 in Los Angeles; July 18 in Boston and San Francisco; July 25 in Chicago, Lake Worth, Fla., Minneapolis, Philadelphia, San Diego, Washington and Wilmington, Del.; and Aug. 1 in Atlanta, St. Louis and Seattle, with more cities to follow.)

-- Andrew O'Hehir

Offline Chuck and I watched this last nite. It is a lovely documentary with wonderful photos and home movies. I especially loved the drawings that Don made of Chris and others.

Couples of any stripe can learn a lot about love and relationships by watching this movie. Chris(topher Isherwood) and Don decided not to obtain a pet but instead to make each other their pet and give each other the affection that otherwise would be siphoned off by the pet. Thus, Chris became Old Dobbin the horse (he was 30 years older than Don) and Don is a lovely cat. This concept was illustrated in beautiful animations taken from the birthday cards they had given each other over the years.
"chewing gum and duct tape"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Bump
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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CHRIS & DON: A LOVE STORY (2007) Full Documentary on Youtube
« Reply #37 on: July 24, 2017, 05:23:05 pm »



[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJsczmtGjxs[/youtube]
Chris & Don - A Love Story (2007)
Published on Jun 29, 2017











Offline Chuck and I watched this last nite. It is a lovely documentary with wonderful photos and home movies. I especially loved the drawings that Don made of Chris and others.

Couples of any stripe can learn a lot about love and relationships by watching this movie. Chris(topher Isherwood) and Don decided not to obtain a pet but instead to make each other their pet and give each other the affection that otherwise would be siphoned off by the pet. Thus, Chris became Old Dobbin the horse (he was 30 years older than Don) and Don is a lovely cat. This concept was illustrated in beautiful animations taken from the birthday cards they had given each other over the years.





Chris & Don: a love story

(USA, 2007, 90 mins)
Directed By: Guido Santi, Tina Mascara

When 18-year-old Don Bachardy was introduced to 49-year-old Christopher Isherwood in 1950s Malibu, neither man knew it would be the start of a love story that would last for 30 years.

Chris & Don chronicles their years together, with the vibrant and engaging Don at this extraordinary documentary’s epicenter. Don, a UCLA student with artistic talents, became the ideal companion for Isherwood, the celebrated British writer best known for his Berlin Stories.

Despite their age difference, a relationship blossomed, and Don soon moved in with Chris. Growing up in the LA suburbs enamored with Hollywood, Don had crashed premieres to take photos with celebrities. With Chris, he suddenly found himself hobnobbing with all manner of luminaries from the arts and literary scene, such as WH Auden, Igor Stravinsky, and Tennessee Williams.

Encouraged by Chris, Don developed his artistic ambitions in art school and eventually found his own fame as a painter, with Chris as his regular model. Open about their relationship at a time when homosexuality wasn’t discussed in polite conversation, Chris and Don weathered the various storms resulting from their different ages, classes, and backgrounds, and remained together until Chris’ death in 1986.

Combining interviews with Don, Chris’ personal journal entries, rare home movies, and archival footage, Guido Santi and Tina Mascara have crafted a very personal story, best demonstrated through the charming animated sequences depicting the horse and cat alter-egos the couple doodled on their personal letters over the years. Chris & Don is a touching, illuminating portrait of the enduring power of love.

A sleeper hit at the Telluride Film Festival, CHRIS & DON: A LOVE STORY is the true-life story of the passionate three-decade relationship between British writer Christopher Isherwood (whose Berlin Stories was the basis for all incarnations of the much-beloved Cabaret) and American portrait painter Don Bachardy, thirty years his junior. From Isherwood’s Kit-Kat-Club years in Weimar-era Germany (the inspiration for his most famous work) to the couple’s first meeting on the sun-kissed beaches of 1950s Malibu, their against-all-odds saga is brought to dazzling life by a treasure trove of multimedia. Bachardy’s contemporary reminiscences (in the Santa Monica home he shared with Isherwood until his death in 1986) artfully interact with archival footage, rare home movies (with glimpses of glitterati pals W.H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky and Tennessee Williams), reenactments, and, most sweetly, whimsical animations based on the cat-and-horse cartoons the pair used in their personal correspondence. With Isherwood’s status as an out-and-proud gay maverick, and Bachardy’s eventual artistic triumph away from the considerable shadow of his life partner, CHRIS & DON: A LOVE STORY is above all a joyful celebration of a most extraordinary couple.

CHRIS & DON will open on June 13 2008 at New York's Quad Cinema, 34 West 13th Street, (212) 255-8800



The Trailer:
http://www.zeitgeistfilms.com/chris&don/




"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"