Lesbian Directors Calling the Shots (page 2)
by Danielle Riendeau, December 4, 2006
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Kami Chisholm is a director who has worked in both formats, and has used her shorts to break into features. Chisholm's films have appeared in hundreds of film festivals — especially queer festivals — worldwide, and she boasts an extensive repertoire, including narrative shorts, feature documentaries and experimental films. Why work in the short format? “Well,” she replies, “you've got to demonstrate that you can handle a short before anybody will let you direct a feature film. Making these kinds of short films is about moving up.”
Chisholm boasts a strong academic background, having studied film at Loyola Marymount, and she is currently completing a doctoral degree in History of Consciousness at the University of California Santa Cruz. Her films are very often an extension of the subject matter she works with academically: issues of gender representation, sexuality and queer identity.
“What drives me as a filmmaker is a desire to tell different stories than what we currently see represented in mainstream cinema,” she explains. “The ability to tell the kinds of stories you wouldn't see in Hollywood films, but with similar production values [to Hollywood films] would be my goal.” For example, she says, “I'm very interested in exploring female masculinity in narrative film.”
Chisholm has a few ideas about why the queer festival circuit is thriving right now. “I think there's something very special about [the festivals]; people go to them because they get to see the kinds of films they don't get to see otherwise. Of course they see the mainstream films that are shown, but people go and see the documentaries too! Our screening of FtF [Female to Femme, Chisholm's feature documentary] was sold out. People want to come and see things made by people in their community. And that, to me, is the best feeling ever — that's what makes it all worthwhile.”
Community is also an essential aspect of film according to Madeleine Lim, the executive director of the Queer Women of Color Media Arts Project in San Francisco. The organization offers free workshops to women in the community, teaching them the essentials of film production in intensive 16-week sessions. As the mission statement says, “ QWOCMAP promotes the creation and exhibition of films and videos that increase the visibility of queer women of color, reflect our life stories, and address the vital social justice issues that concern our community.”
In addition to her work conducting the workshops, Lim is also a successful filmmaker, having directed the award-winning Sambal Belacan in San Francisco and the experimental short Dragon Desire, which premiered at Frameline, the San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival. She has won numerous awards and distinctions, including the 1997 Award of Excellence from the San Jose Film & Video Commission's Joey Awards, and has been named Artist-in-Residence by the California Arts Council.
Unlike some other directors, Lim feels that the short can be much more than just a bridge to bigger things; it is an art form in its own right. “I think the opinion out there is that shorts are just the stepping stone to making feature length films,” she acknowledges. “Personally, I think it takes a lot of skill to make a short film really work because you have so much less time, and your storytelling really has to be very, very tight. To me, the power of the film is not about the length; it's really more a question of how well the story is told in the time that suits it best.”
Lim advises filmmakers to seek out their own voices: “I would say, make something that is personal to you, something that has importance to you. If you can do that, it makes your story unique and interesting.” She also recommends submitting to the festivals in order to get that voice heard. “Once it's completed, the key to getting it out there is to get it entered into a fairly large and well-known film festival, for example, Frameline.”
Why start with a large festival as opposed to something smaller or more local? “The reason is that programmers from smaller festivals and international festivals go through Frameline's catalogue,” Lim explains. “Once it's in a big festival, you'll get programmers coming to you, asking you for your film to be entered into their festival, as opposed to going around knocking on doors, trying to get someone to look at your film.”
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