Film Arts Fest: Women in Love
As we waited in line to enter the Roxie for last Friday's screening of Women in Love, we were very excited to see this film. A documentary on the "sexually radical lesbian community of San Francisco" is an intriguing concept, so we were anticipating an eye opening film about this fairly visible segmant of San Francisco society.
As the film opened, we were even more excited, as we realized that the primary participants were the most excellent adult filmmakers Shar Rednour and Jackie Strano and the award-winning photographer Phyllis Christopher. With participants like this, we felt we were in for a great ride, as we knew that these womens' voices and perspectives would make for a great film.
Alas, that film has not been made, as Women in Love turned out to be less about women in love and more about one woman, filmmaker Karen Everett, endlessly talking about being in love, or not being in love, or being unhappy about being in love. We felt exhausted for Everett's friends and paramours, all of whom patiently endured on-camera interview after on-camera interview, in which they spent less time discussing their own feelings on love than they did discussing Everett's feelings on love.
We got so angry with Everett, and wanted to ask her "What's the point of making a film with all these fascinating women, when all you want to talk about is yourself?" We watch Everett agonize over her present relationship, endlessly dissect her past relationships with the exes who would participate in conversations, and generally take the life out of every interaction through over-discussion. Remember that part in Truth or Dare when Warren Beatty castigates Madonna for not wanting to do anything off camera? It was like that, but without the singing.
Rednour and Strano provide most of the genuine moments in the film, and were the only people in the film who didn't seem to be manipulated into only discussing Everett. We wanted to cheer when Rednour rips into Everett, accusing her of allowing her desire to document every single moment to keep her from actually experiencing any of the moments in any sort of real way.
To Everett's credit, that conversation with Rednour was enough of a wakeup call that she ended the project shortly thereafter. In the post-film Q&A she acknowledged that this would be her final work of memoir, so we can only assume that she realizes that her method of self-exploration isn't a terribly productive one.
It's not that it's a bad movie, not at all -- in fact, it's masterfully made. However, we don't see Women in Love as a movie about women in love -- we see it as a film about the destructive nature of talking everything to death instead of just going out and doing it, and how that destruction can be compounded by the masterbatory nature of self-filming. If you're looking for a movie about love between women, this is not your film. If you're looking for a real-life lesbian David Holzman's Diary, however, this is the movie for you.