Talking Gender Parity in the Immersive World at the FilmGate Interactive Media Festival

No film fest is complete these days without an attempt to tackle the vast gender inequality that’s long afflicted the industry. So it comes as no surprise that the sixth edition of the FilmGate Interactive Media Festival devoted an entire panel to searching for remedies when it comes to immersive media. “Reaching True Gender Parity in Interactive Storytelling” proved to be a fascinating chat amongst four fervent ladies — Marie-Pier Gauthier of the National Film Board of Canada (who also served as panel moderator), HP’s Global Head of Virtual Reality Joanna Popper, Vivian Marthell, who leads local art house O Cinema, and FilmGate’s own executive director Diliana Alexander. Sitting in the comfy leather recliners at the cozy Silverspot Cinema — a five-minute walk from the Eurostars Langford, the hotel in one of downtown Miami’s landmark beaux arts buildings where guests were put up — we audience members (who refreshingly included quite a few dudes) were treated to a no-holds-barred discussion filled with both frustration and hope.

To read all about it visit Filmmaker magazine.

Call Her Ganda is an indictment of Western imperialism, transphobia, and injustice

PJ Raval’s Call Her Ganda is a film I’ve been raving about since catching it at Hot Docs last spring. It’s the story of Jennifer Laude – Filipina, trans and a sometime sex worker – whose 2014 murder at the hands of a US Marine stationed overseas might have gone unnoticed, like the vast majority of victims of violence fitting Jennifer’s many marginalized identities. Instead the 26-year-old’s death sparked not only a national outcry, but led to an international showdown over issues far beyond gender or sex – and straight into matters of unequal justice, unleashed militarism and American imperialism.

To read the rest of my review visit Global Comment.

How to act like a man in the age of #MeToo

The recent #MeToo years have made me wonder why the sexual assaults I experienced as a teen didn’t have much impact on my life. At first I chalked it up to my own resilience – though now I’ve come to believe it was as much in part due to the behavior of the men around the men who harassed me.

To read my reflections visit Global Comment.

“It’s about the Barriers to Justice that Exist when you are Poor and Up Against a Foreign Superpower”: PJ Raval on Call Her Ganda

Fresh off its Tribeca world premiere, and currently wrapping up at Hot Docs (till Sunday, May 6th), Call Her Ganda, an alumnus of Spotlight on Documentaries at IFP Week, is the latest feature from 25 New Faces of Independent Film alum PJ Raval. The thought-provoking doc follows the heartbreaking and utterly thorny story of Jennifer Laude, much beloved by a doting mother (who called her by her nickname “Ganda,” which means “Beauty”), sisters, and her German fiancé. After a night out with girlfriends back in 2014, the 26-year-old ended up being murdered by US marine Scott Pemberton, who left her naked body in a hotel room bathroom, her head in the toilet. That Jennifer had the bad luck of being a member of an oft-ostracized community — in this case trans sex workers — in a country (the Philippines) that allows for the US military to be exempt from its local laws, is what makes her tragic death also so very complicated.

What makes Call Her Ganda so powerful is that Raval smartly widens the lens to tell Jennifer’s tale through the afterlife of her death, an event that brought together three real-life wonder women — a grieving mother who refuses to let her daughter be shamed, a tenacious, trans American journalist with roots in the Philippines, and a cisgender female lawyer determined to put a check on US imperialism.

Filmmaker caught up with Raval during Hot Docs to discuss what happens when human rights activism collides with American impunity in a country now run by a brutal, anti-Western, strongman.

To read my interview visit Filmmaker magazine.

"We Have Only Scratched the Surface of What is Possible in Erotic VR Media”: Jennifer Lyon Bell on Her Fantasy Film Workshop and Creating Erotic VR

The last time I interviewed veteran filmmaker Jennifer Lyon Bell for this site topics ranged from “fair trade” porn to the inaugural Holy Fuck Film Festival in Amsterdam (where the expat feminist pornographer has long resided). And now Bell, recipient of both the Feminist Porn Awards 2014 Movie of the Year (for Silver Shoes, which premiered at London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts) and a psych degree from Harvard, continues to expand her mission of providing sex education for those behind the lens, while also exploring the new media horizon through her own artistic work.

I caught up with Bell to hear more about two sex-related endeavors in particular – “Fantasy Film Workshop: Design Your Own Erotic Film,” a full-day workshop that just completed at this year’s Raindance, and Second Date, an unscripted, Virtual Reality 360° “portrait of two young people fumbling towards ecstasy” that is screening this week at the VR program at CPH:DOX.

To read the rest visit Filmmaker magazine.