April 1, 2004: Room 3-270, 6pm

Truckdrivers With Chutney and Happiness Forever

Mann Ke Manjeere Breakthrough (www.breakthrough.tv), India/USA, 18 min.

This package includes two music videos with vocals by Indian classical singer Shubha Mudgal. The title track - Mann Ke Manjeere is filmed as the exuberant journey of a woman who leaves an abusive marriage and becomes a truck driver. Inspired by the real life story of Shamin Pathan, the video raises important issues violence against women, women in non-traditional occupations and women’s access to public space. The second video Babul exposes the various forms of domestic violence faced by middle class women.

Miss Manju Truck Driver dir. Sherna Dastur, 2002 India, 52 min.

Miss Manju is a truck driver who defies gender stereotypes. She describes herself as half Shiva, half Shakti (man/woman) who "doesn't need anybody else's power." This betelnut-chewing and cross-dressing businesswoman hangs out with the boys and comes home to a girlfriend and a family who call her 'big Daddy'. This beautifully shot observational documentary, filled with close-ups of busy Indian roads and night cafes, has been structured as a poetic story of an original trailblazer as well as the social landscape surrounding her.

Chutney Popcorn dir. Nisha Ganatra, 1999, USA, 92 min. (www.ChutneyPopcorn.com)

Chutney Popcorn is a humorous look at the meaning of family and friends from a different perspective. When Sarita discovers she can't have children, Reena finds that for the first time in their lives, she, Reena, can do something her perfect sister Sarita can't: get pregnant! Obsessed with helping her sister and winning her mom's approval to go ahead with her plan, Reena decides she'll have the baby and then give it to her sister and brother-in-law. Now she just needs to convince her commitment-phobic girlfriend to go along with the idea.

Sixth Happiness dir. Waris Hussein, 1997, UK, 97 min.

Fictional biography of the life of disabled author Firdaus Kanga, growing up in Bombay's Parsee community. Brit is a charismatic boy plagued by a bone disease, which stops him from growing when he is only four feet tall. Nurtured by his family and by a loving and eccentric group of friends in post-colonial Bombay, Brit faces life with a wry matter-of-factness beyond his years. Life changes abruptly when Brit is abandoned by his newly married sister, and his father is cruelly torn from him. Though pledged to marry a deaf girl, Brit falls in love with the handsome Cyrus, with whom he shares a wild romance. With Cyrus, Brit begins to accept himself for the first time, and we witness his transformation from a timid boy to an ambitious, self-assured young man.

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April 2, 2004: Room 34-101, 6pm

From BomGay to LA: A tribute to Riyad Wadia

BomGay dir. Riyad Vinci Wadia, Jangu Sethna, 1996, India, 11 min.

A collection of six short films based on the poems of R Raj Rao, the only published gay-fiction writer in Bombay. BomGay uses the often harsh, sometimes lyrical poetry of R. Raj Rao to portray a gay subculture that is fast maturing in cosmopolitan India.

A Mermaid Called Aida dir. Riyad Vinci Wadia, 1996, India, 52 min.

A fascinating documentary that reveals the enigmatic real life story of India's most famous transsexual, the fabulous Aida Banaji. Director Wadia explores the politics of gender and in doing so, boldly challenges perceptions of race, culture and social morality.

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April 3, 2004: Room 34-101, 3pm

Get Out of Here! and Goodbye…in Pink!

Summer in My Veins dir. Nish Saran, 1999, India, 45 min.

A gay Indian filmmaker travels across America with his family visiting from India, as he struggles to come out to them.  He was tested for HIV before he left for the trip and will not receive his results until they return. The filmmaker explores the dynamics of secrecy and love that mark this very close family. Pushing the limits of personal documentary every moment, every achingly intimate moment – including coming out to his mother – is caught on tape. 

Theen dir. Ambika Samarthya, 2001, USA, 16 min.

The story of a South Asian male caught between his white gay lover and his childhood female friend from India.

Beauty Parlour dir. Mehreen Jabbar, 2000, Pakistan, 18 mins.

Four faces, four masks: four short sketches of the lives and loves of three women and a eunuch as they talk about their desires traced through their visits to the beauty parlour and other everyday events.

Everything dir. Harjant Gill, 2002. USA, 7 min.

A gay Indian-American male's view on religion, harassment in high school and the fear of getting AIDS.

Junky Punky Girlz dir. Nisha Ganatra,1996, USA, 12 min.

One afternoon in the life of a young woman from the East Village in New York City… With the help of two of her friends, she goes to get her nose pierced. This simple act leads her to examine her feelings regarding her traditional Indian Heritage – what this heritage means to her, when her daily life is immersed in things American. Mix in a shopkeeper who only speaks Hindi, her concerned Indian mother, a couple of nose-rings, a filet-o-fish – and you get – Junky Punky Girlz!

For Straights Only dir. Vismita Gupta-Smith, 2001, USA, 22 min.

Told from the perspective of a straight sister about her gay brother, this film explores the prejudices faced by the gay South Asian community (India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal). Interviews with other gay and lesbian South Asians expose the deep-seated denial of homosexuality within this community and the dismissal of the gay sexual orientation as a "western vice". Through the film, the filmmaker points out the irony of such dismissal, as she explains that one of this culture's most treasured ancient texts, the Kama Sutra, actually celebrates homosexuality.

The Goddess Method dir. Punam Sawhney, Canada, 2000, 6 min.

The Goddess Method opens with a young queen assailed by parental bitching  "Where did we go wrong!"  but offers an unexpected solution. The beleaguered boy becomes a drag queen, a cool dancing tranny who taps the inner goddess to fight the evil forces of parent and society. In a dazzling swirl, the queen's wild dance collapses the voices of disapproval into a mélange of harmless chatter.

Erotic Exotic dir. Atif Y. Siddiqi, Canada, 1998, 19 min.

A poetic narrative of immigration from Pakistan to Canada that speaks of discrimination. The themes of sexuality, gender and cultural identity are prominent in this camp illustration. In the first vignette, a high society transvestite comments on the status of women in Pakistan and how they are ill treated by men. In the second, she transforms into Pari, a dancer who is rebuked by an Islamic fundamentalist on the basis of homosexuality. In the third part Pari arrives in Canada to negotiate his desire for a western male in a song and dance routine that salutes Indian Cinema. "Erotic, Exotic, put your hands all over my sari!"

Bijli, dir. Adnan Malik, USA 2003, 16 min.

As the sun sets over Manhattan, the inconspicuous Fayaaz morphs into Bijli, a voluptuous Pakistani drag queen with a feverish following in the South Asian gay and lesbian community. Yet beneath the flamboyant stage presence lies a courageous individual who has carved out a cherished identity for herself in a world quick to label her as an 'outsider'. Understanding herself as a woman trapped in a man's body, Fayaaz has spent a life struggling between the polar tensions of male/female, East/West and Islamic faith/promiscuity.

South Asian, Happy and Gay. VOICES: Gay Identity in South Asian Society dir. Darshana Dave, USA, 2003, 22 min.

Three people talking on topics like being gay, coming out, family, dealing with the 'marriage question' et al. This includes one non-Asian person – the theatre director Paul Knox, who presents a sort of other side – how the white/American world perceives the South Asian Gay community.

Main Shaayar Badnaam (A Defamed Poet) dir: Vishwas Kulkarni,2003, India, 4 min. (http://www.fabulouslab.com/)

Designed as a fake public service capsule, Main Shaayar Badnaam (A Defamed Poet) is an elegy to a gay man's aspirations within the Nationalist framework. In this regard, the short also functions as fantasy: the music video is imagined as if played on Doordarshan, the Government-controlled Television Network. And therefore, indifferent references to lakes, mountains and streams. Examining the fractured zeitgeist of the homosexual condition in India, Main Shaayar Badnaam merges Doordarshan with gay pornography from Germany. The short consciously employs low-technology as its motif to critique the inherent flaws of nationalism.

Barefeet dir. Sonali, 2002, USA 6 min.

Barefeet is an experimental narrative of a South Asian woman who struggles to come out to her family in India. This short film weaves issues of sexuality, displacement, nostalgia, and diaspora through poetry, music, and moving image.

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April 3, 2004: Room 34-101, 8pm

Goodbye…in Pink!

The Pink Mirror dir. Sridhar Rangayan 2002, India, 40 min.

This film gives us a vibrant glimpse of what happens when activists take to the screen. This groundbreaking film made by a gay couple with deep history in the queer organizing scene in Mumbai is the fun fantasy of every South Asian drag queen. Men bring out the best in queens… and sometimes the worst. When two bitchy drag queens and a sly gay teenager lust after a handsome hunk… can seduction, jealousy and cunning be far behind? Using the Bollywood soap idiom of song, dance and drama 'India’s first film on drag queens' is a campy look into the Indian homosexual closet with the undercurrents of humane issues: alternate family bonding and the lurking impact of HIV/AIDS.