by Mattie Lucas
Cinema from a Decidedly Queer Perspective
Flow | 2024
After surviving a devastating flood, a cat finds itself clinging to safety on a boat with a capybara, a crane, a dog, and a lemur. The five of them can't communicate, and each has unique needs as they fight for survival in this watery new world, but they soon realize that through their combined strengths, they can only survive together.
Memoir of a Snail | 2024
Adam Elliot's 2009 film, Mary and Max, felt like something of a minor miracle at the time, a work of stop-motion animation that dealt, both seriously and humorously, with decidedly grown up themes of depression, loneliness, and mental illness. Memoir of a Snail is Elliot's first feature since his acclaimed feature debut, and while it doesn't quite reach the heights of Mary and Max, it's still a lovely film in its own right.
A trans woman gets out of bed and pads across the room to the bathroom. She is naked. She goes to the bathroom. She brushes her teeth. It is a ritual I've performed so many times without a second thought, and now I'm watching it in a movie. I am struck by how commonplace this feels, how incredibly normal. I notice that her body isn't that different from mine. This is not a hyper-sexualized porn star; this is a regular transgender woman living a regular life. Our bodies are so often fetishized that it feels wholly transgressive to see a nude trans woman on screen simply existing - not being used as a sex object or an object of pity, just another woman going through motions that feel so mundane yet so familiar.