Hide and Seek

Director: Su Friedrich

1996 USA 65' 16mm b&w


If the game of hide-and-seek calls to mind nostalgic images of youthful innocence, then Su Friedrich offers
the necessary antidote to remind you how quietly tortuous and sweetly beguiling the rites and passages of early adolescent sexuality can be. Brilliantly intercut with documentary
interviews detailing childhood lesbian deeds
and desires, with schoolday
photographs of little lesbians, and with archival footage of
mid-century sex education films, Friedrich's narrative highlights the clearly articulated homophobia surrounding
the muted beginnings of adolescent sexuality in the 1960s.

Chels Holland, in the poignant role of the tomboy Lou, offers a resonant portrayal of the requisite early-teen
oscillation between sultry cool and humorous vulnerability as Lou increasingly recognizes but is
unable to express the gap between her and the girls around her, a gap layered with desire,
jealousy, and anger. Through Lou, Friedrich provocatively sutures the sexual lure of the wild,
foreign terrain that is adult sexuality and our domestic "silly rites of passage" in a manner that
Margaret Mead could only point at.

A stunningly successful union of multiple narrative styles,
this film is a must-see for fans who have watched Su Friedrich's films over the years, for
all--dykes, especially--who have tried to reconstruct a personal history of queer sexuality,
and
for anyone who wants to relive the wonder of a stash of *Playboy*s found under the parental mattress.


Director Profile - Su Friedrich

With over twelve film credits including the powerful 1984 *The Ties That
Bind*, Su Friedrich is a vital figure in the history of feminist and lesbian/gay film,
and maintains
an international reputation for her innovations in film form
and for her distinctive editing. If
through some fluke of fate you haven't seen her films yet,
get in line for your ticket fast!


Rules of the Road

Director: Su Friedrich

1993 USA 31' 16mm color

Awkward emblem of suburban domesticity, the family station wagon absconds with the camera in
*Rules of the Road*, Su Friedrich's alternately deadpan and nostalgic commentary on the
fortunes of a lesbian relationship. The director's witty relation to a former girlfriend's 1983
Oldsmobile Wagon, seemingly misplaced as it cruises the streets of New York City, drives home the
complexity of the metaphors we use to narrate our desire. It may mean little to say that
Americans love their cars, but what happens when cars themselves are mobile
meanings--vehicles for love?
How do we negotiate, to cite Friedrich, "what makes one car lovable
and the other a heartbreak?"
The director will give a brief talk after the screening of this program.


Hide And Seek + Girls Shorts

5/17 (SUN), 11:30 / Spiral Hall (3F)

Adam

Director : Andrea Stoops

1996 USA 4' 16mm color

Intrepidissima

Director: Marta Balletbo-Coll

1992 Spain 7' 16mm color in Catalan with Japanese and English subtitles

Enceinte ou lesbienne? (Pregnant or Lesbian)

Director: Fran*oise Decaux Thomelet

1997 France 4' 35mm color in French with Japanese and English subtitles

Monsters in the Closet

Director: Jennifer Reeves

1993 USA 15' 16mm b&w


Girls who have wet dreams about insects? ... Four lesbian shorts from Europe and North America
chosen for the second screening of *Hide and Seek* expand Friedrich's theme of childhood and
adolescent desires.
Andrea Stoops' Adam recounts the basement adventures of a 9-year-old girl-as-boy who takes

up with a younger playmate. Marta Balletbo-Coll's Intrepidissima offers a tale of resistance to
ormative femininity that
is orchestrated through music and sabotage,
while in Fran*oise Decaux Thomelet's Pregnant or
Lesbian, magic realism provides an erratic negotiation between
parental immaturity and
adolescent awareness. Finally, queer images and distorted narration give a rough
but rich texture
to Jennifer Reeves' exquisitely frenetic short on adolescent "perverse" desire
and the hostilities it
resists.


<< HOME | Programs98 >>

(C) Tokyo International L&G Film&Video Festival