Fun Fact: This film was funded by the National Endowment for
the Arts and after filming the producers and Jennie Livingston were sued for
not paying their most featured performers. Paris DuPree sued for $40 million!
But they all dropped their cases when the attorneys pointed out that they all
signed release contracts. Then $55,000 was divided up and paid to 13 of the
participants.
So that is kind of a joke and adds to our discussion of
unfair treatment.
I decided to Google the film and see what some actual
transgender viewers thought of the film and to learn a bit more on Jennie
Livingston. I first noticed that it had a 100% rating from Rotten Tomatoes…so
that’s impressive!
I then found a blog by a transgender reacting to viewing the
film. The post points out that by the time the film became popular, ball
culture and vogueing were nearly dead. Many of the same views we discussed in
class were mentioned in this post. Misrepresentation was determined a common
theme in the film
I found an article were a journalist interviewed Jennie
Livingston. The most interesting part of this interview was when the interviewer
asked her, “Did you keep going to balls after
the film was complete?”
Her response? “I was done.” What
does that mean? She thought of it as work and wanted to stop? Or she didn’t
really care in the first place, so when the film was over, she was too? I’m not
sure how to read into that, but I still found it quite interesting.
In the final post I read through, Huffington Post talked to
people of the transgender community. This article described how Paris is Burning was accurate in
portraying family and HIV/AIDs in that culture. The article said how the film
helped bring attention to the issues surrounding the community.
If you want to read the articles, the links are below. I’m
not 100% on my opinion and reading of the film and its representation of the
transgender community. That’s probably because I don’t know much about the community
in general. Everything I’ve learned has been through films and articles such as
these.
Livingston might have said "I'm done" because she just wasn't interested in the topic anymore. I think a good example of this is in any big research project I have had to do, the professor has always said that when we're done with it, we should be sick and tired of it, which could be what happened to Livingston. Or maybe since the balls were a thing of the past, she didn't see that as a way to research this topic anymore.
ReplyDeleteI found Livingston’s response to the question, “Did you keep going to balls after the film was complete?’ to be very interesting. Like Kasey mentioned, she could have just got burnt out on the topic and needed to focus her attention on something else. However, it made me think more about Hooks’ argument on Livingston and her “white privilege”. Livingston is lucky that she even has the choice to leave the balls, when the subjects of the film have no choice. I think her simple response of; “I was done.” demonstrates that she does not even realize how fortunate she is. Before learning about that answer, I really struggled accepting Hooks’ argument that Livingston with her white privilege created a film that allows the dominant culture to mock this community of people. The reason being the significant amount of time that Livingston had to spend building those connections with her subjects and just the amount of time she had to spend at the balls. I could not see how her being a white, female could interfere with the significant amount of exposure she was having with this community. Even so, that simple quote, for me, demonstrates that maybe Livingston really did not care about the representation of this community, but cared more about producing a film that would get her name out there. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about Livingston, but I do still strongly like the film and feel as if it was beneficial to this community of people.
ReplyDeleteI thought your whole post was interesting. I had no idea that she was sued because she was sued because she didn't pay the people in her film. I think it's particularly disheartening because she knew the financial status of the people that attended the balls. Taking that into account, her "I was done" comment sounds harsh and that she didn't really care in the first place.
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