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New Queer Cinema: The Director's Cut
B. Ruby Rich designated a brand new genre, the New Queer Cinema (NQC), in her groundbreaking article in the Village Voice in 1992. This movement in film and video was intensely political and aesthetically innovative, made possible by the debut of the camcorder, and driven initially by outrage over the unchecked spread of AIDS. The genre has grown to include an entire generation of queer artists, filmmakers, and activists.
As a critic, curator, journalist, and scholar, Rich has been inextricably linked to the New Queer Cinema from its inception. This volume presents her new thoughts on the topic, as well as bringing together the best of her writing on the NQC. She follows this cinematic movement from its origins in the mid-1980s all the way to the present in essays and articles directed at a range of audiences, from readers of academic journals to popular glossies and weekly newspapers. She presents her insights into such NQC pioneers as Derek Jarman and Isaac Julien and investigates such celebrated films as Go Fish, Brokeback Mountain, Itty Bitty Titty Committee, and Milk. In addition to exploring less-known films and international cinemas (including Latin American and French films and videos), she documents the more recent incarnations of the NQC on screen, on the web, and in art galleries.
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New Queer Cinema: The Director's Cut
B. Ruby Rich designated a brand new genre, the New Queer Cinema (NQC), in her groundbreaking article in the Village Voice in 1992. This movement in film and video was intensely political and aesthetically innovative, made possible by the debut of the camcorder, and driven initially by outrage over the unchecked spread of AIDS. The genre has grown to include an entire generation of queer artists, filmmakers, and activists.
As a critic, curator, journalist, and scholar, Rich has been inextricably linked to the New Queer Cinema from its inception. This volume presents her new thoughts on the topic, as well as bringing together the best of her writing on the NQC. She follows this cinematic movement from its origins in the mid-1980s all the way to the present in essays and articles directed at a range of audiences, from readers of academic journals to popular glossies and weekly newspapers. She presents her insights into such NQC pioneers as Derek Jarman and Isaac Julien and investigates such celebrated films as Go Fish, Brokeback Mountain, Itty Bitty Titty Committee, and Milk. In addition to exploring less-known films and international cinemas (including Latin American and French films and videos), she documents the more recent incarnations of the NQC on screen, on the web, and in art galleries.
B. Ruby Rich designated a brand new genre, the New Queer Cinema (NQC), in her groundbreaking article in the Village Voice in 1992. This movement in film and video was intensely political and aesthetically innovative, made possible by the debut of the camcorder, and driven initially by outrage over the unchecked spread of AIDS. The genre has grown to include an entire generation of queer artists, filmmakers, and activists.
As a critic, curator, journalist, and scholar, Rich has been inextricably linked to the New Queer Cinema from its inception. This volume presents her new thoughts on the topic, as well as bringing together the best of her writing on the NQC. She follows this cinematic movement from its origins in the mid-1980s all the way to the present in essays and articles directed at a range of audiences, from readers of academic journals to popular glossies and weekly newspapers. She presents her insights into such NQC pioneers as Derek Jarman and Isaac Julien and investigates such celebrated films as Go Fish, Brokeback Mountain, Itty Bitty Titty Committee, and Milk. In addition to exploring less-known films and international cinemas (including Latin American and French films and videos), she documents the more recent incarnations of the NQC on screen, on the web, and in art galleries.
B. Ruby Rich is Professor of Film and Digital Media at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She has written for scores of publications, from Signs, GLQ, Film Quarterly, and Cinema Journal to The New York Times, The Village Voice, The Nation, and The Guardian (UK). She has served as juror and curator for the Sundance and Toronto International Film Festivals and for major festivals in Germany, Mexico, Australia, and Cuba. The recipient of awards from Yale University, the Society for Cinema and Media Studies, and Frameline, Rich is the author of Chick Flicks: Theories and Memories of the Feminist Film Movement, also published by Duke University Press.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction xv
Part I. Origins, Festivals, Audiences
1. Before the Beginning: Lineages and Preconceptions 3
2. The New Queer Cinema: Director's Cut 16
3. Collision, Catastrophe, Celebration: The Relationship between Gay and Lesbian Film Festivals and Their Publics 33
4. What's a Good Gay Film? 40
Part II. Bulletins From the Front
5. The King of Queer: Derek Jarman 49
6. True Stories of Forbidden Love 53
7. Goings and Comings, the Go Fish Way 58
8. Historical Fictions, Modern Desires: The Watermelon Woman 66
9. Channeling Domestic Violence: In the Den with Todd Haynes and Christine Vachon 72
10. The I.K.U. Experience: The Shu-Lea Cheang Phenomenon 76
Poison, Far from Heaven, and Boys Don't Cry - Christine Vachon
"Ruby Rich's New Queer Cinema is funny and deeply insightful—I loved going back to the good, bad old days of the ’90s and seeing how those times (and their intense sense of urgency) exploded into an auteur-driven cinema today."
John Waters
"I thought I knew a lot about gay movie history until I read New Queer Cinema and realized what a dunce I was. Ruby Rich has to be the friendliest yet toughest voice of international queerdom writing today. She's sane, funny, well-traveled, and her aesthetics go beyond dyke correctness into a whole new world of fag-friendly feminist film fanaticism."
Depression: A Public Feeling - Ann Cvetkovich
"At last, an anthology of B. Ruby Rich’s groundbreaking work on New Queer Cinema—a valuable historical archive with the added bonus of her current reflections on it. Smart, passionate, and engaging, her writing keeps alive the fine art of criticism that is so crucial to sustaining filmmakers and their audiences."
Gus Van Sant
"The greatest writer on New Queer Cinema! Buy Rich's book! It's amazing!"
