Vampires and Violets: Lesbians in the Cinema - Softcover

Weiss, Andrea

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0224035754 ISBN 13: 9780224035750

Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd, 1992

Synopsis

For lesbian audiences who saw Garbo's film in the early 1930s, Queen Christina will always be the lovely girl who dressed in male attire and refused to marry, and no amount of heterosexual cover will ever change her. The story of lesbians and the cinema, told for the first time in Vampires and Violets, is a love-hate affair in which the invisible becomes visible in fascinating and surpirising ways. The lesbian vampire for instance, cinema's most persistent lesbian character, acts out male fantasies of sexual challenge and titillation, but she is also an agent of female desire that is both dangerous and excessive. Gossip and camp have enabled the stars - Dietrich, Garbo, Hepburn - to hold particular, magical appeal for lesbian filmgoers. Andrea Weiss follows the lesbian character in Hollywood films, from Dorothy Arzner's The Wild Party through The Children's Hour, Rebecca, Silkwood and The Color Purple. She explores lesbian sexuality in European art cinema, and modern independent work by lesbian filmmakers. With wit, insight and liberal illustration she brings into her discussions a wide range of films, both popular and forgotten, as well as the work of contemporary directors Chantal Akerman, Su Friedrich, Ulrike Ottinger and many others.

About this title

Synopsis:

Andrea Weiss reclaims the lesbian film heritage from early silent cinema to the Hollywood of yesteryear to today's art and independent cinema. She takes on Hollywood and how "Tinsel Town" exploits lesbian characters in its films. She looks at the appeal of stars to lesbian audiences. She explores camp, gives a view of vampire films in their gory detail and tests out her ideas upon readers who will also be film buffs. She also gives attention to modern film directors like Chantal Akerman, Su Friedrich, Marlene Gorris and Ulrike Ottinger. Andrea Weiss is a cultural historian and Emmy Award-winning film maker. She won her Emmy for the documentary "Before Stonewall", co-authored the companion book. Her subsequent films have won awards at festivals worldwide.

About the Author:

Andrea Weiss is a filmmaker and cultural historian. She won an Emmy for her research on the documentary Before Stonewall, and her subsequent films have won awards at festivals worldwide. A New Yorker, she lives in London.

About this edition

• Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd
• Publication date: 1992
• ISBN 10: 0224035754
• ISBN 13: 9780224035750
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 192