2025 National Womens’s Music Festival
Film Festival
Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project
Directed by Joe Brewster, Michèle Stephenson
2023 | 102 minutes
A look at the life of poet Nikki Giovanni and the revolutionary historical periods through which she lived, from the Civil Rights Movement to Black Lives Matter.
Winner of the Grand Jury Prize in the Sundance U.S. Documentary Competition, this beguiling documentary portrait follows poet and activist Nikki Giovanni as she approaches 80. (Note, sadly, Nikki passed away December 2024.)The film explores Giovanni’s Afrofuturist-feminist philosophical outlook as well as her poignant relationship with her family, her political audacity, and her poetic eloquence, all knit together with a constant eye and ear for its subject’s own aesthetic verve.
Looking back at a personal life and history cast in the long shadow of American racism, and forward to hopeful, possible futures, Giovanni acts as our guide and narrator, with refreshingly unorthodox filmmakers Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson refraining from traditional chronologies or talking-head conventions. Going to Mars is fueled by constant intellectual engagement and radical imagination in the search for emotional and political fulfillment in a world of disenfranchisement.REVIEWS:“Like 2016’s I Am Not Your Negro, Raoul Peck’s film about James Baldwin’s final, unfinished tome, Going to Mars responds creatively to the call of its ingenious subject. – Lisa Kennedy, Variety“Simply Majestic. A masterpiece. A journey through the mind of brilliance.“- Jeanine T. Abraham, Black Girl NerdsAWARDS: (partial list)
2024 Winner Primetime Emmy – Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking
2023 Winner Grand Jury Prize – Best Documentary – Sundance Film Festival
2023 Winner Jury Prize – Outstanding Documentary Feature – Frameline International Film Festival
Esther
Esther Newton Made Me Gay
Directed by Jean Carlomusto
2022 | 92 minutes
A feature documentary about the pathbreaking cultural anthropologist, dog agility enthusiast, and iconic butch lesbian, Esther Newton.
SYNOPSIS
ESTHER NEWTON MADE ME GAY explores the life and times of cultural anthropologist Esther Newton. The film tells her story of awakening to gay life in the 1950’s, the women’s liberation movement and lesbian-feminism, drag culture, and forging a butch identity that for her is in conversation with trans-masculinity. Keenly attuned to the societal forces that shaped her life, Esther guides us through an anthropology of herself, a study influenced by her love for a sport – competitive dog agility – that pairs her aging butch body with her beloved dog teammate on an obstacle course that is constantly changing.
Throughout her career, Esther was a pioneer – questioning and challenging status quo assumptions on gender, sexuality, and anthropological methods. Her work inspired generations of scholars to pursue research in what would eventually become the field of LGBTQ & Gender Studies.
“This is an amazing documentary about history, huge achievements, relationships, and competence. It will make you emotional, enthralled, and excited. A true embodiment of strength and endurance. To see the world through Esther’s eyes is a true privilege.”
Cassandra W Lesflicks
- Best Documentary, Some Prefer Cake Film Festival
- Best Documentary Feature, Warner Brothers Discovery Audience Award, Provincetown International Film Festival
- Best Documentary Feature Jury Award, Out at the Movies International Film Festival
- Martin Contreras and Keith Orr Film Award for Best LGBTQ Film at the Ann Arbor Film Festival
SALLY!2024 | 94 minutes | Closed Captioned
A radical lesbian feminist (not to mention something of a sapphic Casanova) whose trailblazing vision and ebullient personality were the spark for movements with far-reaching impacts, the legacy of Sally Gearhart has also largely been erased from history. From the defeat of the Briggs Initiative to the founding of the first Women’s Studies program in the nation, to groundbreaking writing on lesbian separatist communities, Gearhart was a fierce-hearted San Francisco political preacher at the center of many iconic movements of the 1970s and 1980s.
In this heartfelt documentary following her journey from a 23-year-old professor at a Christian college to her final days surrounded by a diverse and dedicated community, director Deborah Craig (A Great Ride, Frameline42) re-centers the charismatic Gearhart who ignited movements, fought tirelessly for change, and created lasting bonds. Deftly weaving archival footage with interviews spanning decades, Sally! illuminates the personal and political context that defines Gearhart’s legacy, humorously and thoughtfully celebrating her while also confronting the controversies and limitations of lesbian separatism. Sally! is a rare watch that honors its subject as both an icon and a beloved, complex individual.
Audience Award, Favorite Doc, Way Out West Film Festival
BETWEEN WORLDS2023 | 67 minutes
Originally conceived and written by Bay Area nonagenarian playwright and actor, Naomi Newman (co-founder of A Traveling Jewish Theatre), Between Worlds weaves together a narrative storyline with Irena Klepfisz’s poetry, describing seminal moments in the poet’s life and her role as the “keeper of accounts” of a vanished world. Immigrating to New York, Irena tells of her struggles with a new language and the pull of the world left behind and reveals intimacies as she explores her passions as a lesbian, the pleasures of a life-long relationship, and the death of a loved one.
The multi-cultural, multi-generational, and LGBTQ cast of actors is accompanied by an original score created and performed by renowned musicians percussionist Barbara Borden and Susanne DiVincenzo on cello and bass.
The World According to Allee Willis
Directed by Alexis Spraic
2024 | 98 minutes
Hit maker. Boundary Breaker. Pop Pioneer. The most accomplished lesbian you may not have known about! Award-winning songwriter/artist Allee Willis pursued creative expression at all costs while struggling to fit established gender and sexual norms – until she found a path to love.
Synopsis:
Take one look at award-winning songwriter / artist Allee Willis and you see someone seemingly unafraid to be themselves. Dressed in a cacophony of prints and colors, her signature asymmetrical haircut and famed parties, Allee didn’t waste any opportunity to tell you what she was about. Super talented and amazingly prolific, she not only wrote “Neutron Dance” for the Pointer Sisters, “September” for Earth, Wind and Fire and the theme song to TV hit “Friends,” but hundreds of other songs – which sold over 60 million records.
But privately, Allee struggled with not fitting established gender and sexual norms. She buried herself in her work, until true love manifested her ultimate masterpiece – self-acceptance. This film is the realization of her wish that her “final art piece be someone putting together the trail I have left behind.”
REVIEWS:
“An engaging tribute to songwriter/visual artist Allee Willis, who wasn’t a household name, but much of her work is world-famous. The documentary has her quirky charm and empathetically details her personal struggles.” – Carla Hay, Culture MIx
“This is one of the few celebrity docs that is just as interesting as the subject itself, and made me wish we did live in Willis’ maximalist, art-forward world.”- Marya E. Gates, RogerEbert.com
AWARDS:
2024 Winner – Best Documentary – Frameline. San Francisco International LGBTQ Film Festival
2024 Winner – Best Documentary Feature – Hampton International Film Festival
2024 Winner – Best Documentary Feature – Tallgrass International Film Festival