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Enlarge Cover
list price: $15.95
edition:Paperback
category: Performing Arts
published: Nov 2013
ISBN:9781551525198
publisher:
Arsenal Pulp Press
Description
A Queer Film Classic on the stunning 1991 documentary about the drag subculture in 1980s New York.
This latest addition to the Queer Film Classics series is an homage to Paris Is Burning, Jennie Livingston's brilliant and award-winning 1991 documentary that captures the energy, ambition, wit, and struggle of African-American and Latino participants in the 1980s New York drag ball scene. An unlikely hit when it was first released, the film is a lively, touchingly empathetic portrait of urban drag culture, introducing such performers as Willi Ninja, Pepper LaBeija, and Angie Xtravaganza. Paris is Burning generated enthusiastic buzz from audiences and critics, as well as impassioned debate: did the film present a subversive perspective on the crass values of the 1980s, or did it exploit its subjects and pander to privileged movie audiences? Regardless, the film is considered one of the key films of the New Queer Cinema, and resonates with audiences to this day.
Author Lucas Hilderbrand contextualizes the film within the longer history of drag balls, the practices of documentary, the fervor of the culture wars, and issues of gender, sexuality, race, and class.
QUEER FILM CLASSICS is a critically acclaimed book series that launched in 2009, edited by Thomas Waugh and Matthew Hays, covering some of the most important and influential films about and/or by LBTQ people made between 1950 and 2005, and written by leading LGBTQ film scholars and critics.
About the Authors
Lucas Hilderbrand is associate professor of film and media studies and queer studies at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Paris Is Burning: A Queer Film Classic (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2013) and Inherent Vice: Bootleg Histories of Videotape and Copyright as well as numerous essays on queer media histories. He is currently researching a book on the history of gay bars in the US. He lives in Los Angeles.
Thomas Waugh is the award-winning author or co-author of numerous books, including five for Arsenal Pulp Press: Out/Lines, Lust Unearthed, Montreal Main: A Queer Film Classic (with Jason Garrison), Comin' At Ya! (with David L. Chapman), and Gay Art: A Historic Collection (with Felix Lance Falkon). His other books include Hard to Imagine, The Fruit Machine, The Romance of Transgression in Canada, and The Perils of Pedagogy: The Works of John Greyson. He is co-editor (with Matthew Hays) of Queer Film Classics, a series of monographs for Arsenal Pulp Press on classic LGBTQ films; titles in the series include Paris Is Burning, Strangers on a Train, Law of Desire, and Female Trouble. He is Professor Emeritus at Concordia University in Montreal,where founded the Concordia program in sexuality studies, the Concordia HIV/AIDS Project, and Queer Media Database Canada Quebec (mediaqueer.ca).
Matthew Hays is a Montreal-based critic, author, and university and college instructor. His articles have appeared in a broad range of publications. His first book, The View from Here: Conversations with Gay and Lesbian Filmmakers (Arsenal Pulp Press), was cited by Quill & Quire as one of the best books of 2007 and won a 2008 Lambda Literary Award. He is co-editor (with Thomas Waugh) of Queer Film Classics, a series of monographs for Arsenal Pulp Press on LGBTQ films; titles in the series include Paris Is Burning, Strangers on a Train, Law of Desire, and Female Trouble. He is the film instructor at Marianopolis College, and also teaches courses in journalism, communication studies, and film studies at Concordia University, where he received the Concordia Alumni Award for Teaching Excellence in 2007 and the President's Award for Teaching Excellence in 2013.
Editorial Reviews
Hilderbrand embraces the rich cultural text with signature breadth and an impassioned personal narrative. -Lambda Literary
— Lambda Literary
Hilderbrand ... examines the film's legacy, documents its production and subsequent theatrical release in 1991, and reconciles his own feelings with its contested place in academic debates. The author's compact history is dense with intertextual references. ... Hilderbrand does an admirable job of placing the film in conversation with contemporaneous works ... and recent films that show its influence ... This book is both a worthy teaching tool and an in-depth survey for film lovers. -School Library Journal
— School Library Journal
