Close your windows and shut your curtains girls
You never know who is watching or recording

Rosanne Strott and Emily Niland, Massachusetts College of Art and Design students didn’t know they were allegedly being filmed by two male Wentworth Institute students while the young women were in bed together. The young women discovered the video in April, four months after the video had been in circulation on a Wentworth college Web site, reported ABC News “Video Voyeurs Under Fire for Taping Lesbians” June 13.

The young women are now taking judicial action against Wentworth Institute juniors David Cunha and David Siemiesz, who are suspected and charged by Boston police of filming the two young women while they were having sex and uploading the video on the college’s Web site, who recently appeared at Roxbury District Court.

It is alleged that the young men were able to film the scene from their dorm room, located directly across an alley from Strott’s dorm room, in September.

"When I found out, I immediately vomited," Strott told ABC News. "It was a really strange thing for me. I had never felt so violated without being touched before."

Altcinema presents

QUEER(Y)ING FEMME

Film screening - FtF: Female to Femme, with short film The Insomniacs

Lecture - "A Brief History of Femme" by FtF co-director, Kami Chisholm, Ph.D.A benefit for Altcinema Productions

Saturday May 24, 20087:30 - 9:30 p.m.

Tickets: $12 advance, $15 -$100 at the door

San Francisco LGBT Community Center
1800 Market Street, San Francsico

Come out and support queer cinema!

Purchase tickets online at www.altcinema.com.

For more information or to volunteer, please contact

info@altcinema.com or 415.863.2183.

About FtF: Female to Femme (directed by Kami Chisholm and Elizabeth Stark, Frameline Distribution, 48 min., 2006):

Imagine a world in which the journey toward femme was understood to be as radical as journeys to claim and inhabit other queer bodies. Envisioning more than it documents, FtF: FEMALE TO FEMME celebrates dyke femme identities, combining farce and seduction with analysis and personal history. For years, femmes have forged community and created space for themselves out of edgy performance and authentic parody. FtF recognizes these strategies and builds them into an unforgettable sexy, funny and moving film. FtF features a host of fabulous femmes, including actress/writer Guinivere Turner, novelist/activist Jewelle Gomez, poet Meliza Bañales, rock stars Leslie Mah (Tribe8) and Bitch (Bitch & Animal), professors, activists, artists and dancers. The filmmakers ask these thinkers and performers to use the language of gender transition to talk about femme identity, opening up new possibilities for understanding femininity while reinforcing connections among gender warriors around the world. A wildly original extravaganza, FtF: FEMALE TO FEMME presents a saucy, indelible portrait of a people and a politics central to the gender revolution.

Plus, the new butch-femme romantic comedy, THE INSOMNIACS (directed by Kami Chisholm, 11 min.,2008): Bell has insomnia. So one restless night, she decides to go to the local Insomniac's Anonymous 3 a.m. meeting, and there she meets Helena, the girl of her waking dreams.

About Dr. Kami Chisholm:
Kami Chisholm, founder of Altcinema, holds a Ph.D. in History of Consciousness from UC Santa
Cruz and is a graduate of Loyola Marymount University's Film Production department. FtF: FEMALE TO FEMME, Chisholm's first (co-directed) feature documentary, premiered in June 2006 at Frameline30: The San Francisco International LGBT Festival. In 2007, Chisholm produced and co-edited the festival hit GODSPEED, a short about a trans bike messenger directed by Lynn Breedlove and Jen Gilomen. Chisholm is also the director of over 10 short films, including the recently completed romantic comedy, THE INSOMNIACS. Currently, Chisholm teaches feminist/queer/race theory, sexuality studies, and visual culture at California College of the Arts.
Purchase tickets online for QUEER(Y)ING FEMME at http://www.altcinema.com/store/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=51.

Bi Request is back for a second round

Great news: Bi Request is happening again in 2008!

Bi Request is the bisexual short film program at the annual San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival, the largest and most prestigious LGBT film festival in the world. This is the festival that sets the standard for film fests on a global scale. If a film is shown at the San Francisco International, it often gets requested by dozens and dozens of other festivals, many of whom create their roster in part by going through the program guide of this festival. That means big exposure for the film and the opportunity for the filmmaker to share their art with LGBT people around the world.

A couple of years ago, the B and the T were added to the end of the SF International name - but I noticed right away that that didn't correspond to having any bi films in the program. I riled up a bunch of bi folks and our allies and turned into a major squeaky wheel about this! Frameline, the organization that puts on the festival, was quick to respond, and worked with me to actively solicit and promote bi material in last year's festival. Yay!

With Frameline, I volunteered on projects around bi-inclusively, including: helping update their submissions form to include an emphasis on the search for work by bisexual film-makers/ about bisexual people; sharing information with them on how to see bi content in films; and curating the first ever Bi Request program.

Bi Request was a huge success, with a packed theatre and fabulous short films about bisexual lives and by bi film-makers from around the world. Five of the film-makers were in attendance, including one who flew all the way from Australia to proudly show her work.

And now, we're doing it again! Frameline has asked me to volunteer again this year to curate Bi Request, and I jumped at the chance - it's so much fun! So please help me spread the word. Bi film-makers (and film-makers who have make films about bisexual lives/ featuring bisexual characters) can send their short films directly to me for consideration in Bi Request, or they can go through Frameline. If they want to send their films to me, the deadline is February 15th, and the address is:

Amy Andre
PO Box 14821
San Francisco, CA 94114

Let your film-making friends know about Bi Request. And, if you're in San Francisco in June, please make plans to attend Bi Request, too!



Here are some links of interest:

To send a submission to Frameline: http://www.frameline.org/filmmaker-support/festival-submissions/
(You’ll see the new statement about looking for films from underrepresented communities - including bi folks!)

To read about my "squeaky wheel" dialogue with Frameline: http://www.amyandre.com/film.html

To read about Bi Request: http://laughingsquid.com/squidlist/events/index.php?com=detail&eID=168645&year=2007&month=6

And info about Bi Request in Wikipedia, of all places!: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frameline

Cheers,

Amy