SF Indie Fest: Born in a Barn

Michael Ney's Liberty in Restraint (linked page contains embedded Quicktime) which preceeds Born in a Barn, isn't for the faint of heart. The audience responded with audible discomfort to images of a muscleman hammering nails into his arms. Yowch. The documentary follows around Noel Graydon, who takes artsy photos of bondage, and also happily participates in the scene. He explains that his mission is to take fetish photos from the inside looking out, and so he does -- with ropes, flogging, bloodplay, fiendish electrical devices, and so forth. Liberty in Restraint sets the mood nicely for Born in a Barn -- though the behavior therein is a bit more extreme, it's the same idea: offbeat behavior; a little unsettling to the uninitiated because it's hard to figure out exactly what its subjects are trying to accomplish; and in the end, they're just doing what makes them happy. As two chipper lesbians in Liberty in Restraint explain, "we come across places where you just feel the need to f**k ... so we do." Sounds good to us.

Now let's be clear about what the folks in Born in a Barn are up to: they like to pretend that they're ponies. Sometimes it's sexual, sometimes not. Usually, some pony-themed leather bondage gear is involved. Sometimes, LOTS of pony-themed leather bondage gear is involved. For some, it's a lifestyle; for some, it's a hobby. They're all pretty private about it most of the time, with a few rare exceptions. Everybody got it? Good. Let's move on.

Born in a Barn has a difficult mission -- to present unusual behavior in a way that does not immediately separate its subject from its audience. It would be all too easy (and fun!) to make fun of folks with unusual interests; to hold them up and make them look stupid. But no - Born in a Barn is actually really sensitive and personal -- you really get to know these folks, and before long, what they do sounds almost ... reasonable. One woman tells an absolutely heart-breaking story about how, as a child, she was completely devoted to horses until she developed an allergic reaction to them. "I thought something inside of me had died that I'd never find again," she says, and immediately everyone in the audience whimpered "awww," because who hasn't lost something incredibly important in their life? We all know what that's like. "And..." she continues, her face lighting up, "...I found it again." Later on, the same woman explains, "I've never felt graceful ... I always through being big was bad, and for me, this makes being big good." You just want to give her a big old hug, she's so damn happy to have found the thing that she loves.

The documentary gives us what seems to be a pretty solid overview of how ponyplay impacts the lives of its practitioners, especially in the case of a husband and wife ponyplaying team. At times, their activities seems sort of fun and sweet -- when she rides him around the house and rubs him down, they both have that look of bliss that two completely in love people get when they're just so glad to be together. Other times, the film takes a step back, and it seems like they might be isolating themselves in a ponyplayish bubble from the rest of society. As they're walking home from a prancing session, their play-garb and bare legs poorly concealed beneath Matrixy trench coats, the wife waves and offers a "hello" to a neighbor who seemingly does not respond. Even their dog, in what may be the most brilliant cutaway we've ever seen, reacts with perk-eared fascination to their behavior. During a Q&A after the film, filmmaker Elizabeth Elson said that the subjects of the documentary rarely allow their fantasy life to intersect with their real life, since reaction would probably not be positive. An audience member commented that whenever she dresses as a pony and pulls a carriage through Golden Gate Park, onlookers are always very friendly and nice; other audience members nodded at this tidbit and murmered, "that's San Francisco." It sure is. We wonder what sort of behavior would finally cross the line and cause San Franciscans to stop being friendly and nice in the face of unusual behavior.

Another of the documentary's main subjects is a guy who goes by the name of Trigger, who's looking for a long-term mate who shares his interest. He looks wistfully out into the distance as he talks about past romances and his search for love; later on, as he's hugging a dog and speaking affectionately to her, your heart just bursts for the guy. "So many people to hug," he coos to the dog, scratching its head as it gazes contentedly around. Awwwwww, yay snuggling -- that's a need that just about anyone can understand. Trigger's so sweet and gentle and helpful and vulnerable that you forget that he's built a life around something kinda weird; he's just doing what makes him happy. "I'm a professional pony," he tells the camera, giving it a huge goofy grin, and suddenly it's so much easier to laugh with him than at him.

Which isn't to say that you couldn't laugh at the ponies if you wanted to. After all, they're grown men and women running around and playing pretend like a bunch of weirdos. But you know, we're big fans of weirdos. They're neat. And we bet you a million dollars that there's something extremely peculiar about you too -- you know there is -- so you should only be so lucky as these folks who've managed to carve out a comfy place for their eccentricity. Yeah, the limits they've placed on their own behavior are probably more relaxed than yours ... but when you get down to it, they're just good, kind, harmless folks -- in fact, they can be downright boring -- and Born in a Barn is a fine way to make their acquaintance.