Frameline39: the San Francisco International LGBTQ Film Festival will kick off in a few weeks at the city’s glorious Castro Theatre showcasing hundreds of new LGBT films along with one very special vintage presentation: a screening of the 1983 gay classic, Querelle. In honor of what would have been director Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s 70th birthday the festival is also premiering a new documentary portrait of the famously challenging gay German filmmaker, Fassbinder: To Love Without Demands.
Fassbinder’s swan song adaptation of the Genet novel, Querelle is also notable for generating an excellent array of great movie posters. The U.S. campaign for the film settles for a simple hunky shot of star Brad Davis leaning against a wall, with a lot of boring text about how this is “Fassbinder’s last and most controversial film.” The French have him leaning against something much more interesting (also gotta love the special Andy Warhol version – below).
Johnny Angelo Paccini
I <3 QUEERS IAM ONE TOO
MarionPaige
Oh My God! Like, OMG and shit.
There are other people on the planet who’ve heard of Querelle? Like,
first, MOMA showcases Bruce LaBruce films and now the movie based on Jean Genet’s novel Querelle is being presented to young’uns who’s knowledge of dance music goes all the way back to 1981. Here’s a little obscure reference …
Jean Genet actually made a short film and, in that film, two prisoners in adjourning cells share the smoke from a cigarette by inserting a reed through a hole in the concrete wall separating their cells. The Gay Adult Director Jonno, I think, did a reference to this in a video in which Will Helm’s jail guard shares the smoke from a cigarette with prisoner Paddy O’Brian at UKNakedMen.
Bruce Dillon
Chi Chi La Queer APPROVES!
(*;*()
Jerry Mitchell
Would Love to see this movie
Danny Ray
Querelle is one of my all-time favorite queer films! Rainer Fassbinder was a pure genius!!! May the forever rest in peace!!!
Jenni Olson
Yay Frameline!
Billy Budd
It is a very bizarre but strangely sexy movie. I like it.
Kangol
@Billy Budd: It is incredibly strange, but I do like this movie a lot. I remember being a teenager and sneaking in to see this film.
Rainer Werner Fassbinder was one of cinema’s geniuses. I always wonder how many young viewers are aware of his work, some of which is really over the top, but most of it is now available on Netflix, and also is in many library collections, so you can check him out.
darian
Never heard of him but it looks worth checking out.
enfilmigult
I thought this was pretty dreadful when I saw it years ago…but don’t regret seeing it as an oddity, because it’s certainly that. One of Fassbender’s most overwrought, inexplicable movies, at least that I’ve seen.
Kangol
@darian: If you do check out Fassbinder’s work, also check out:
Ali, Fear Eats the Soul
The Marriage of Maria Braun
The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant
Veronika Voss
Fox and His Friends
These are less eccentric than Querelle, and among his masterpieces.
MarionPaige
I sense that some don’t have a feel for how “alive” Querelle was BEFORE the movie. My first exposure to Querelle was via excerpts from the novel in gay mags. And, at the time, it came across as this exotic explicit gay fiction that was too hot for America. It’s like looking at the movie “A Clockwork Orange” …
Some people see “A Clockwork Orange” as a Stanley Kubrick CREATION whereas some of us already had that movie in our heads from having read the book.
When I read excerpts from the novel Querelle back in the day, I thought a movie about it would be like the Australian movie Head On (also a book), i.e., a sailor having this series of random sexual encounters. The movie Querelle as realized by Fassbinder explored a lot more things. I still haven’t read all of Querelle so I don’t know how faithful the movie is to the novel. But still,
I think it is pretty f-ing inaccurate to view Querelle as a Fassbender thang.
ingyaom
Loved “Fox and his Friends”… and anything by Fassbinder.
stranded
I saw it when i was like 20 and getting really into gay cinema. It was a torrent and the pictures looked hot, so got it. My first impression was, “Jesus what shit.” It was almost cringe worthy, which is why i recommended it to tons of people. Sebastiane is similar but kind of more tolerable.
Billy Budd
@stranded: I LOVE Sebastiane too. My foavorite part is his worship of the god Apollo. And all the gorgeous male nudity, of course.
Billy Budd
@Kangol: I saw only these:
Ali, Fear Eats the Soul
The Marriage of Maria Braun
The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant
Querelle
And I liked them very much. Especially ALI.