Fashion, Hollywood and Homosexuality in Gillian Armstong's WOMEN HE'S UNDRESSED

If the name Orry-Kelly means nothing to you, you're either young, straight, or simply uninterested in the heyday of Hollywood and its famous fashion designers. TrustMovies has never been all that interested in fashion (he often quite literally loathes it), but he is bi- and has had a hard-on for Hollywood since around the age of two (when he ran away from home and off to a "picture show," as he then called the movies). Although he didn't realize it until he saw the film under consideration here, he's also been a huge fan of Orry-Kelly's work. Those memorable gowns from Les Girls, above, are in fact long-time favorites of his (the movie may be second-rate, but its fashions are absolutely first-).

The new documentary about Orry-Kelly, WOMEN HE'S UNDRESSED has been directed by Gillian Armstrong (shown above, at right, with multi-Oscar-winning costume designer Catherine Martin) and written by Katherine Thomson, both of them Australian, as was Orry-Kelly himself (who, for purposes of space and repetition, will henceforth be referred to as O-K). What these two have given us is really a kind of celebration of O-K: his life, work, sexuality and in particular his ability to live a relatively uncloseted life in tinseltown long before many other gay men cared to and/or were able to do anything like this.

Incredible as it seems, O-K costumed some 301 movies between the years of 1930 and 1963. And many of these were amazing, pivotal works whose costumes were vital to the films, and, as one of the many fascinating interviewees points out, they look as good, and almost as "modern," today as they did back then. O-K clothed some of Hollywood biggest stars -- from Bette Davis and Rosalind Russell to Marilyn Monroe and Shirley MacLaine -- and most of them loved him and his work. One of the joys of this lovely documentary is how well it makes us understand what and how the designer was doing, why it was important and especially why it worked so well. You'll come away from the movie with a new (maybe renewed) sense of the importance of fashion to films.

The movie also captures this Hollywood era in spades, with particular emphasis on what it was like to be gay in Hollywood from the 30s into the 50s and early 60s (O-K died in 1964). We get a good sense of the man's history, and the filmmakers choose to do this via some charming and intelligent re-enactments using actors in the roles of O-K (a sly, sweet job by Darren Gilshenan, above, as the adult O-K, and Louis Alexander, below, as the younger version),  his mother (Deborah Kennedy), and even briefly his first and perhaps greatest love, a fellow named Archie Leach (known to you all as Cary Grant and played in this film by Nathaniel Middleton).

Based in good part on O-K's unpublished memoirs -- which, according to Wikipedia, were discovered in the care of a relative after the man's death -- the film does full justice to the designer's humor, panache, style and wit, regarding both his work and his attitudes. I suspect he would be pretty damned pleased with this funny and charming documentary -- in which some very good and still-living costume designers, along with actors like Jane Fonda, who worked with the man a few times in her early career, talk about him fondly and with great appreciation.

Ms Armstrong, whom many of you still remember for My Brilliant Career) does a fine job of keeping all this moving and snappy so that interest does not lag for a moment. And her interweaving of the reenactments with historical footage and scenes from various film makes her documentary non-stop eye-opening and appealing.

The movie is a fine appreciation of a man and his time in a town that was anything but welcoming of his kind -- and yet in which he managed to make a place and a name for himself. This is a wonderful story, and -- despite a couple of odd fact mistakes -- I am so glad we are now able to see it. (That's a photo of the real Orry-Kelly, at left.)

From Wolf Releasing and running 99 minutes, Women He's Undressed opens tomorrow, Friday, July 29, in Los Angeles at the Arena Cinema for a week's run, after which it hits home video on Tuesday, August 9 -- for purchase or rental.

Black & Muslim & Gay & Under FBI surveillance -- whew! Jay Dockendorf's NAZ & MAALIK

Yet another of those movies said to be inspired by "true events," NAZ & MAALIK, the new Brooklyn-set film written and directed by Jay Dockendorf (shown below), certainly gives its two eponymous heroes plenty to contend with. Yet, instead of treating this rather full plate -- race, religion, sexuality and law enforcement harassment -- as something full of drama and/or melodrama, the filmmaker instead offers it up (with the rather embarrassing exception of  how he handles the FBI surveillance) in a realistic, if somewhat romantic, documentary style.

On the one hand, it's refreshing to see black, gay Muslims treated with the kind of honesty and respect we might see in other movies featuring straight, white Christians or Jews. Plus, the lovely performances by the two leads -- Curtiss Cook, Jr. (below, left, as Maalik) and Kerwin Johnson, Jr. (below, right, as Naz) -- gives the movie what little juice it has, bringing us over to the side of these two young men and keeping us there, for awhile, at least. The movie begins with some promise: a blackmailing sister, its Bed-Sty background, and a probably mildly-illegal trade by the two boys who re-sell Lotto tickets on the street. One can appreciate Dockendorf's wish to engulf some realism, but he spends so much time with repetitive and finally not-so-enlightening Lotto-tickets episodes that we soon long to go elsewhere.

We do manage to get into a local mosque, only briefly, and into the homes of the kids, but we don't learn nearly as much as we could from all this (the dialog, while often sounding "real" is also alternately expository and a little tiresome). Mostly we spend time with the two boys, watching Maalik push for more physical intimacy, as Naz backs away.

Many of the scenes smack of too much overt exposition, and once the FBI gets involved they smack of amateur hour, as well. I don't question that an agent might possibly pull a gun on the suspects while questioning them on the street, but as shown here, this scene is unreal and embarrassing.

The biggest problem is that the movie has no momentum; it simply wanders. When some momentum finally comes, it is provided by, of all things, a chicken. The reason for the chicken and way the final scenes add up also seem more problematic and "managed" than they are believable. And while this lack of momentum does help the movie resist melodrama, unfortunately it resists any real drama, too. And then, instead of ending, it simply stops.

I applaud the moviemaker's tackling of themes this weighty and the performances of his two lead actors. This is Dockendorf's first full-length film, so perhaps we'll see more and better in time to come.

From Wolfe Releasing and running 86 minutes, after a successful LGBT film festival exposure, the movie has its theatrical debut in New York City at the Cinema Village this Friday, January 22, with a DVD and digital release from Wolfe Video fast following on Tuesday, January 26.

Turning Turing into a more-or-less mainstream hero: Morten Tyldum's THE IMITATION GAME

Alan Turing is a name known to many of us, particularly gay men, because he was a hero of World War II, perhaps the most important of them all, due to his breaking of the famous Enigma code which was used by the Nazis and changed daily to prevent its being deciphered. Some years back there was a fine British play that eventually came to Broadway -- Breaking the Code by Hugh Whitemore -- that starred a wonderful Derek Jacobi as Turing and told the tale of how the man managed to do this, at the same time as he struggled to hide, while still living as a homosexual in Britain (homosexuality was a criminal offense at the time).

Now we have a close-to-equally fine film on this same subject: THE IMITATION GAME, directed by Morten Tyldum (shown at right), with a screenplay by Graham Moore from the book by Andrew Hodges, and starring Benedict Cumberbatch (shown above, and below) as Turning. Mr. Cumberbatch is no stranger to playing odd roles -- Sherlock, Julian Assange, Khan in the most recent Star Trek (he even played Stephen Hawking in a TV movie a decade ago). Here, he beautifully nails Turing's strangeness (the man may have had some milder form of Autism such as Asperger Syndrome, which was never diagnosed back in that day), as well as his whip-smart intellect.

The Imitation Game is quite beautifully put together, weaving past and present into an exceedingly pleasurable experience to view and hear. It moves quickly but never jarringly, and it makes very clear the horrible injustice of having one's sexual preference criminalized. The screenplay is by turns witty and charming, smart and angry, and among its best touches are the numerous scenes of Turing as a schoolboy (well played by Alex Lawther) and its strong focus on the character of Joan Clarke, the woman who came to work with and for Turing as part of the the small group at Bletchley Park who were trying to crack the German code.

As played by the ever delightful and lovely Keira Knightley (above), Ms Clarke takes on major importance in a number of ways -- as a woman pushing to be able to work at what she does best (we're in the 1940s and 50s, remember) and as a kind of significant other for Turing. Ms Knightley comes through as she always does, with grace and grit. She and Cumberbatch work off each other quite beautifully.

The supporting cast, every last one of them, could hardly be improved upon. Especially fine are Charles Dance (above, right) as Turing's boss and bête noire; Matthew Goode (below, left) as the co-worker who initially loathes but finally admires this strange fellow; Mark Strong, (in bottom photo, center) impressive as his name, as an early MI5 member; and Allen Leech (below, right) and Matthew Beard (below, center) as other co-workers; and especially Rory Kinnear as the cop who suspects Turing of treason yet comes to regret his actions against the man.

The filmmakers and their cast have turned this tale into an oddly mainstream entertainment, and one that works almost perfectly as such. They've elided certain events and maybe people, too, for purposes of telescoping and storytelling.

While some of the language is curt and profane, there is no real sex of any kind on view, especially that regarding Turing and his same-sex preference. This will no doubt make it much easier for mainstream audiences to embrace the movie. Homosexuality is talked about but never seen nor experienced, so there is absolutely nothing here to shock or jerk a nose out of joint.

I admired the movie greatly and enjoyed it, too -- finding myself especially moved by the "what happened afterward" title crawl at the end of the film, which turns something that by all rights should make us feel bad into the feel-good instead. The track taken here may knock The Imitation Game down a notch or ten from anything approaching greatness, but it will certainly give the film that chance at copping the Oscar, a la The King's Speech. (If The Theory of Everything, which I have not as yet seen, doesn't grab that gold statuette instead.)

The movie -- from The Weinstein Company and running 114 minutes -- opens this Friday in both New York City  (at City Cinemas Paris Theater and the Angelika Film Center) and Los Angeles (at The Landmark and the Arclight Hollywood).

Julián Hernández is back with a new, nettlesome gay art film in tow, I AM HAPPINESS ON EARTH

Yes, Julián Hernández, the Mexican filmmaker who gave us A Thousand Clouds of Peace, Broken Sky and Raging Sun, Raging Sky has returned with a new film that should prove to most audiences every bit as illuminating/ obfuscating as his earlier work. I AM HAPPINESS ON EARTH is another long (two hours, two minutes) observation of and meditation on gay life, as filtered through the lens, heart and mind of its protagonist, who, this time, is himself a filmmaker. If this makes the movie more personal than usual for Señor Hernández (shown at left, below, with a couple of his cast members), no matter. It is still, as are all his films, concerned with gay life and attraction, sex and longing, meetings and partings. This time, however, the filmmaker seems to be moving a bit toward bi- or maybe pan-sexuality.

I Am Happiness on Earth (IAHOE from here on in) opens with a dancer and a film director who is checking him out. Both are beautiful, and the dancer (below) is lithe and exquisite, as well. An assignation occurs, but when a further date never materializes, our young dancer calls a halt and instead goes off with a couple of his girlfriends, who entice him into a threeway.

That's maybe the first half hour or 45 minutes. Then we cut to a graffiti-laden bathroom in which another man (two photos below) is waking up in a bathtub (this reverberates slightly from an earlier scene). Another dreamy hunk comes into the bathroom, as, downstairs, a young woman (below) writhes on the floor. Yes, weird. But then things grow even weirder.

The men are interested in each other, maybe, and in the woman, too. Cocks and a cunt are unfurled and sex takes place, both soft and hard-core. A lot of watching goes on, for both the audience and the filmmaker. This section reminded me visually of certain movies from the 1960s, and it is different from most else I can recall seeing from this director.

Then we're back with our filmmaker and a call boy he's hired, who eventually turns into a full-time lover. We also see our initial dancer once again (who by now is semi-famous), during which the longing re-surfaces, to which no real follow-up is possible.

Hernández (at left) is a certainly a major force in Mexican gay cinema. I wouldn't miss his films, even though, being rather long and paced somewhat slowly, they occasionally put me briefly to sleep. They're dreamy and erotic, with plenty of male pulchri-tude on display (this time some female, as well -- plus a more ironic commentary on film and filmmaking). They also embrace homosexuality's outsider status, its forbidden side, its treachery and betrayal, its longing, its love of beauty and need for connection. (Sort of like heterosexuality -- minus the outsider/ forbidden status, of course.)

The filmmaker does have some odd tics: His view of dance, in particular, seems weird, as he concentrates almost exclusively on the dancer's head and chest, as though the rest of the body didn't count for much. (Film this may be, but any real appreciation of dance it ain't.) Odd stylistic touches abound: the lack, occasionally, of any sound, and the switch, now and then, from color to black-and-white.

His film also seems to move in fits and starts and clunks, although this may very well have had to do with the Vimeo streaming link I was sent and how it merged with my wireless reception. (That's the trouble with these Vimeo, DAX and other streaming links we critics receive. You can never be quite certain if what you're seeing is an artistic touch or simply not-so-hot reception.)

As for the performances, they're all presumably just what the director ordered. Each actor does what's required -- which is mostly looking beautiful and sexy and full of desire. Not a lot is asked of this cast, acting-wise, while any questions regarding motivation -- "Hey, I'm just doing what the director told me!" -- probably never come up.

By the time IAHOE's two hours have come to a close, we (and presumably our movie-maker) have taken quite a journey. He is left watching a porno tape of himself and his lover engaging in sex -- which may be more real and important for him than was the actual sex itself. And we are left with what I guess is the moral here: Hey, kids: If you want a "real" relationship, don't get involved with a filmmaker!

From Breaking Glass Pictures, the movie opens theatrically this Friday, August 15, here in New York City at the Quad Cinema and in Pasadena at Laemmle's Playhouse 7. For anyone not near those two venues, the following week -- on Tuesday August 19, the film will hit the streets on DVD and across country via VOD/Digital (from all cable providers, iTunes and Amazon Instant Video).

Streamable: Roger Ross Williams' GOD LOVES UGANDA gets "A" for content, "C" for execution

If you're GLBT-friendly, you no doubt already know about the African country of Uganda and its ultra-homophobic stance -- legislation on the brink of being passed that would criminalize homosexuality with imprisonment, and repeated acts of it with the death penalty. Of what you might not be so aware is the role that right-wing, fundamentalist Christian church groups from the USA play in bringing this despicable "purge" into practice. All these blond, blue-eyed, smiley-faced young people bringing despair and death to an already much-defiled (remember Idi Amin?) country is one of the nastiest ironies you're likely to see -- among the many of our new millennium).

What filmmaker Roger Ross Williams (shown at right) has given us in his documentary GOD LOVES UGANDA is a look at what's going on inside and outside this little African country that is dovetailing into the most extreme kind of abuse of gays. He presents a few self-styled African experts on the subject, one of whom explains that he can no longer go back to Uganda for fear of reprisals; another is a churchman who lives there, and who has for years been fighting this anti-gay government stance. Here in our own country, Williams tracks down the religious groups that are sending their "missionaries" to Uganda to preach the anti-gay gospel. Out of all of the teachings of Christ Jesus, you might imagine that these religious nuts would choose from important things such as the Beatitudes from the Sermon on the Mount (often compared to the Old Testament's Ten Commandments). Instead, these nitwits find tiny references (in which Jesus does not even figure) in order to rabble rouse against this minority.

We meet some of these fresh-faced kids and their still-somewhat fresh-faced leaders (above and below), as well as the old cranks who still seem to rule the "Moral Majority" roost. We spend some time with one older "Christian" woman, who finally admits to having had a lesbian affair way back when -- for which, it seems clear, she's still pining a bit and doing a good deal of penance.

The movie spends about one third of its 83-minute time span pussy-footing around its real subject, while setting us up for the kill. When that finally arrives, we keep circling back and back again to the same people and the same ideas. There's too much repetition here, and not the best organiza-tion--even though the subject at hand is certainly compelling & important.

We keep moving back and forth between Uganda and the U.S., hearing from politicians and religious leaders (pro and con the homosexual-bashing), but not from those Ugandans who are being "converted" to learn what they might think of all this, and why. There are few "shadings" here; everything is pretty much black or white. Which makes God Loves Uganda one of those documentaries preaching to the already converted.

You can catch the film -- which will certainly raise your blood pressure a notch or two -- now via Netflix streaming and elsewhere.

George Gittoes' THE MISCREANTS OF TALIWOOD makes MoMA debut; Q&A

Every so often -- but not nearly often enough -- comes along a film that single-handedly defines what the name TrustMovies and the site itself hopes to accom-
plish: putting you in touch with films that do things other media can't or won't, in the process offering up the truth of our world (part of it, at least) in a manner you'll not find elsewhere. Just such a film is making its New York debut with two screenings during MoMA's Documentary Fortnight (February 18 at 8pm in MoMA's Titus 1 theater and February 19 at 4pm in Titus 2). If you want to discover Pakistan, the Taliban, movie-making, hypocrisy, sex (homo & hetero) and death (real & fake) in a combination that I wager you will have not previously come even close to, then line up for THE MISCREANTS OF TALIWOOD from Australian filmmaker George Gittoes (shown below).

The dictionary defines miscreant as an infidel or heretic, one who behaves criminally or viciously. Chief among the many delicious ironies of Mr. Gittoes' movie is that titular word. The Taliban would have us believe that the Pakistani movie-makers are the miscreants here. The movie-makers, however, along with audiences who have finished watching the film, will have other ideas. "Taliwood," as you have probably already figured out, is a play on Hollywood, Bollywood and perhaps some other movie-making "wood" of which I am yet unawares -- and on the Taliban.

Gittoes is a 60-year-old artist/activist who tends to put himself in harm's way by going to the world's current "action" spots to make his films: the 2005 Soundtrack to War (war-torn Iraq) and the 2006 Rampage, filmed in the dangerous projects of Miami, during which the brother of the film's main character was killed. Because, in the Peshawar area of Pakistan (especially the tribal belt, that region called the Northwest frontier that is completely outside the control of the Pakistani government), a foreigner, particularly anyone thought to be an American, can easily be shot on sight, Mr. Gittoes' looks probably saved his life. With long, flowing gray hair and wearing Pakistani clothing, he fits right in, no questions asked. Once the men in charge meet him, so gregarious is he (and Australian rather than American) that they take to him immediately.

Our man in Pakistan is there to help the country's budding filmmakers do their job: concocting movies that are so over-the-top in every way that they make most Bollywood product look subtle and restrained by comparison. (The Pakis do make other kinds of films; read the interview below for further clarification.) Another fine irony is that, while our hearts may go out to these new filmmakers, our minds are reeling from the silliness of what we see on-screen. Not Mr. Gittoes. He's all for them, first documenting what he sees, then being hired to act in their films, and finally putting up the money to produce two of their films (at $7,000 for two full-length movies, this is a deal at which only Zachary Oberzan or Jonathan Caouette might stick up his nose).

In any case, while these movies may not be "Art," they serve multiple purposes: entertaining the masses (most of whom are illiterate and don't have good television reception but can afford the price of $15 to buy a DVD player to watch straight-to-video Pakistani films in their own language) and providing lots of jobs that help feed families and pay for shelter.

As the film moves on, it grows more complex. In a section titled Planet of the Men, Gittoes tackles a subject we hear about mostly via rumor, innuendo and the sleazier kind of Muslim-bashing: the almost complete segregation of the sexes resulting in a kind of enforced homosexuality that, even so, dares not speak its name. The filmmaker talks to several young men who tell of early sexual experiences; one of them is a call boy who plies his trade in a rickshaw, a "love shack on wheels," as Gittoes calls it. These homosexual highjinks ascend into the top echelons of the Taliban, making mosques the most dangerous place for boys to be. This enforced homosexuality brings up another "dangerous" question: Are these boys and young men "gay" if all they've known so far is homosexual behavior and thus consider it "normal." And what does this say about "normal" in Pakistan. Or for that matter, elsewhere around the globe. (In the Q&A that follows this review, Mr. Gittoes offers some additional insight.)

What about feminism? Could there be even the slightest trace of this in a culture that holds women down and back about as well as any in history? Oh, yes. We meet two actresses in particu-
lar: Kirin and NoNo, the former's story is haunting and sad, while the latter's is... hmmmm, different. She's a popular sin-
ger, comedian and dancer, who occasion-
ally makes a sex film, a scene from one of which is leaked via cell phone to much appreciation from her countrymen and considerably less from the Taliban. So NoNo goes into hiding.

You probably didn't know that midgets (or little people) are very big in Pakistani films. We meet two of them here (shown below), as well as a pro-Taliban political figure, Maulana Gul Naseeb, Senator of the MMA party, from whom hypocrisy fairly oozes. The funniest scene occurs as George must shoot his documentary and fiction films simultaneously, which confuses his crew something fierce. Which is which? They continually mix things up.

While George is filming, Benazir Bhutto is killed, and from this point on the film grows increasingly dark-unto-grizzly.  A mosque is bombed (below) and, in an amphitheater, we watch as a 12-year-old boy beheads a prisoner of the Taliban, taking three minutes to do it while showing not a trace of compassion or humanity.  Simple beheading of prisoners, which has been going on for awhile, is failing any longer to bring in the crowds.  Something new must be provided: hence the use of children as executioners.

This area of Pakistan, notes Gittoes is now a theater of terror: "A world where no one knows who's leading us into war, why we're going there, or if anyone has any vision of why we're doing it."  If this brings to mind Gomorrah, not to mention countless narratives and documentaries about Iraq, comparisons are apt.

*****

To derive the best interview possible from this most interesting filmmaker, TrustMovies first sent George Gittoes a list of questions by email, and then spoke to him via Skype (the means for good, cheap verbal communication). The following is a combination of the two, with TrustMovies in boldface and Gittoes in standard type.

How did you get involved in the film?

I do my art and my photos, and then I do my films. One of the creative things I do is to invent my own aid stuff: like bringing attention to land mines in various countries.  For instance, I went up into hills of Afghanistan, and the tribal chiefs there loved it because it brought some attention to the "mines" problem and the world then showed some interest in that area. I put on a huge show in Geneva, too, and started getting money to help with prosthetics clinics. And I'm still involved with those same groups. But now I'm concerning myself with bigger issues. While making Miscreants, I got involved in a self-help program for poor people to get into hospitals, and for young women who are poor to get scholarships.  I got involved with cricketers to put up money for girls in Pakistan to go to school. I convinced Oxfam to fund things there, too. It's kind of combining creative work with aid work. I am tired of how most Non Government Organizations (NGOs) waste money on more administrative costs than on helping the people they're supposed to help.  So basically I have helped create some new NGOs in the Tribal Belt, the region called the NW frontier, which is completely ungoverned and outside the control of Pakistani government. I've been doing this kind of thing now for more than 20 years.  I began it in New York in late 1968-69. Andy Warhol was first person who introduced me to a movie camera. And art critic Clement Greenberg first encourage me to get involved. The sense of what was going on in the streets back then made me go outside and use my camera and my drawing talent along side of what was happening in the world -- and then connect these.

The idea of creativity vs fundamentalism (of any kind) seems more and more important these days. Yet the "creativity" on display in the Paki/Taliwood movies seems almost farcical. Yet it is creativity. And the distance between artists having the right to say something and the worth of what they are saying makes for an interesting tension, at least in the first part of your movie. It reminded me of why we must stick up for free speech, even if we don't agree with what's being spoken. In the Pakistan films that you saw while there, did you notice any major variation in quality? Might there be a budding "great" filmmaker on the Pakistani scene?


The Pashtun films you see in my movie are sections chosen for their impact. There are a lot of family dramas and comedies that are more sober but would not have much colour when taken out of context. However, the films are made for the most uneducated people in the world. There is considered to only be 2% literacy in the tribal belt and it is lower for girls. This means they can not even read their own language. The only form of input they are getting is from these films and radio. They can not develop narrative appreciation through books. The films, therefore, have a melodramatic quality and in many ways resemble silent films. They have to be read visually and an over developed or intellectual script would be over most of their heads, even in their own language. The films do, however, introduce new ideas, such as the liberation of women and their right to be seen. This may seem a small thing but it is very crucial for more than half the population .

It has really pissed me off when various reviewers have said that they can agree with the Taliban in stopping these films because they seem so bad . This is incredible snobbery and could only be said by people living in very safe and comfortable societies .

The other factor is that the films have to pay for themselves; there is no government support. The producers who put up the money are small video store owners who are by our standards quite poor. They are from the lower classes and love films but have to get their money back . They can not risk doing films that test the limits of their audiences to the degree that they might become unpopular. So this is a true example of popular art made for the people and by the people.

The actors and directors are not from the educated classes either. But there was a real hope for them to create great films in the future because of the volume of films they were churning out . They were constantly learning and improving on the job, up to the point that the industry was stopped by the Taliban. None of them have been to actor- or training-schools .

The intellectuals at Peshawar University totally support these working class film makers and often agree to act in the dramas and help improve the scripts. This is a healthy relationship that could lead to collaborations of significant value because the intellectuals are learning on the job as well.

I have been spending my time in Europe trying to get organisations to agree to put money into the Tribal Film Industry. I have succeeded in getting Oxfam to fund the restarting of the local Pasktun film industry by proposing to fund nine of these films each year and let the profits from them go back to the artists. The Oxfam-funded films will take away the 'grind house' necessity to make the kind of films they have done in the past. I will help get this project up and running and will encourage the directors and writers to use this opportunity to make dramas that depend less on big action scenes etc.  But I will not try to realize my creative visions through them.

I am close to and love these filmmakers and want to see them continue to develop. But their development can not be at the expense of losing their audiences. It is of little use to them to make films that will get shown at Cannes , Sundance and the Berlinale if no one wants to watch them in the Tribal Belt. The people of the Tribal Belt are poor and have little joy or escape in their lives. These films make them laugh and are a bit of fun for them in the face of the strict life the Taliban want to inflict on them. I had the opportunity in the two dramas that I made to make "arty" films I could show to audiences outside Pakistan but felt this would be selfish and would have been against my concept of making a couple of Pashtun Films and getting them sold out in the local markets. The money from the dramas went back to the actors and artists working on the films, so I had an obligation to make the films Pashtun hits. They were -- and both films sold over 40,000 copies in Pakistan and Afghanistan . Since they were the last two films made, the money from their sales was all that kept the artists going in the period after their work was taken from them.

Please also note that when people are illiterate they can not get much sense out of foreign films with subtitles, so even Indian films are useless to them. This industry has come about because DVD players have become so cheap -- down to less than $15 US for a player. Each poor village can afford a player and a Monitor and so the movies are shown to fairly large audiences and the discs are swapped around. If you could see the mud hut poverty the films are shown in, you would be shocked. These are places where there is no running water and power only comes from generators:  little health care and a lot of starvation .

What was it like for you to be "acting" in a movie, rather than creating a documentary? Was it fun -- or more of an effort? Are we going to get the chance to see the actual movie you made?

Jim , I am aware that I am a terrible actor and could have only done it because my bad acting fitted the melodramatic nature of these films. It was like being in a junior high school play. But I must say loved the project and enjoyed every moment . As I say in the movie "I felt like a kid who had joined the circus." Of course, I did not enjoy being in a mosque after a suicide bomb attack and there were very down and dangerous moments during the production -- but when I look back on this film I have the fondest memories of anything I have ever worked on. The artists like Javed and No No and little Bul Bul and Isfandear were real friends and great to be with. I am still funding Javed to feed all his kids as there is no work and I could not live with myself to think of them starving . I have paid for Isfandear (midget kick boxer and ice seller) to learn to read and write and speak english  Perhaps he could be the next Mini Me. I am looking forward to being back with them all again on the OXFAM project. That is only a couple of months away .

I would also like to make another doc and drama with some of them in Afghanistan. I will call both films Scarface in Kabul.

I originally intended to try to release the second drama 'Fire' (the comedy is too local to work outside Pakistan) at the same time as 'Miscreants'. This aim resulted in my spending a couple of weeks getting all the actors to dub their speaking roles into English: a huge challenge because none of them spoke any English so they had to imitate the sound of what I was saying . They did a good job and were proud of it (you can hear a bit of it in the doc -- like when Javed and Kirin are together after he gets wounded ). I would still like to do this but do not have the money to do the post-production work that is needed to do the job. I calculate it would cost at least $30,000 to make a release copy . I just do not have that. I am really broke, as the film has not found a distirbutor and has no TV or Cable sales outside Australia (except Poland and that is a small amound) . I put up the money for the project so I am really hurting financially on this and would have no hope of paying to do the necessary work to get it out. It is a shame. Maybe someday.... It would be great if some rich person said, "Hey George-- let me fund this!

How do you manage to make your movie and sort of "comment" on it at the same time?   Miscreants packs in so much information, as well as differing viewpoints.

Most documentarians don't try to play with the form at all.  My film tries to do this -- so that it can work for the MTV generation. The fact that I’ve used two cameras -- always -- means that you get this "in and around" thing. When I got to Kirin’s house, you see me drop the camera and laugh, I say “I think there’s more to this than just finding an actress for the movies.” This would not work with just one camera and one point of view. You need that other, broader point of view. Wherever I go I arrive with two or three cameras, but no crew.  Instead, I find someone I can teach to use the other camera. I couldn’t take another foreigner there because he’d be killed, probably within the day. I speak the language, I’ve got the long hair, I know the walk, the gait, the manner. You can’t be in Western clothes.


Your PLANET OF THE MEN section was particularly interesting to me as a gay/bisexual man. It raises all sort of interesting questions about nature vs nurture. Clearly, as in all cultures, there would be a certain minority of guys who lean toward their same sex. But with so many men engaging in homosexuality (as the easier alternative), it becomes almost like what the right wing over here accuses gays of doing: recruiting "straights" to the "gay" side. Yet this is what the Taliban is forcing on its own culture: Very hypocritical (but then so much engaged in by the powerful in all cultures is hypocritical). Did you have any further thoughts about all this that did not make the cut in your film?

I think this is the one section in the film that Broadcasters are most frightened of. It is the other side of the problem of women not having any freedom. While people like me have spent their lives fighting for gay rights and better understanding of gays it is still important to show the issues in the tribal belt of Pakistan are very different . I think all men there enjoy bi-sexual sex . Most say they prefer 'hard bodies' and by the time they get to be with a woman they have lost the taste for 'soft bodies.' I only have one friend there who says he does not like sex with other men. This is Javed, and I think this is because, as an actor, he has often felt -- well, we might call it 'undue pressure,' as the male actors are expected to sell themselves, just as the women are. As I say in my movie, it is great to be a man there. I enjoy all the spontaneous kisses and hugs and massage etc. I wish all men could be as warm and open and physically affectionate towards each other as are these men of the Tribal Belt.

While over there, one just has to give in to it and accept that close contact between men is natural and enjoy it. I did not take it any further than hugs and kisses and massage with any of my friends there but it was good. Men there really care about each other in an intimate way and it feels really different to have other men reading the slightest emotions of pain or injury or discomfort and trying to do something to make you feel better -- and all this is at a very subtle level. There is a dark side to it, however, when men get most of their intimate pleasure from other men it is easier to downplay the needs and aspirations of women. The Taliban have taken huge advantage of this. Most Senior Taliban Leaders openly have a harem of young boys.

You actually paid the $4,000 to bankroll the movie we see being made? Or did you bankroll two of them for $7,000? (Is this tax deductible as a charitable donation? It should be!)

I paid $4,000 and $3,000.  I am a poor artist, but I did pay this out of my own money and this was only the basic budget. I paid out a lot more for catering and hotels and vehicles etc plus better quality live music etc. Why this next project is so workable for OXFAM is that they can fund nine films for just $38,000 and this will keep hundreds of people in work and they will then be able to feed their families, so it is better than just arriving with truck loads of food etc. It also means some joy can come into the lives of the broader population through the entertainment the movies provide.

I just do stuff and struggle along. Usually I fund what I am doing through the sale of my paintings rather than film returns but it is a struggle. I do not make enough money to pay much tax so the deduction principle is not a factor.

Do you think that the Sufi man (shown at left) really is 115 years old? Do they keep good timetable records there?


Yes, I have a copy of the Sufi birth certificate . His father was a famous sufi -- not as big as the Dalai Lama, but up there. The birth of his son is, therefore, a part of historic record . The old sufi is so loved there will be a shrine and mosque built around him when he dies and he will achieve sainthood. He is already regarded as a saint. I have not heard of his death (and I would), so he must be pushing 117 by now. I hope to spend some time with him when I go back in a few months. I love him dearly and we have a very special friendship that has nothing to do with Sufism or anything. We just love each other.

How do you spell the name of the actress Kireen (or Kiren, shown below)?

Her name is Kirin. She is not to be confused with NoNo who gets into trouble over the porn. Kirin would be phonetic; it could just be spelled as it sounds: whether Kiren or Kirin does not matter. She took the money she got from working on my film and went to Lahore, where it is safer. About 5 female dancers and actresses that I knew in Peshawar have now been murdered. I think Kirin may have gotten some work in the Lahore Industry, which is still semi functional (it is not part of the Tribal Belt where film is totally outlawed).

What happened to NoNo? Is she still alive and working?
NoNo escaped and made an underground Music CD which really infuriated the Taliban because it was so popular. NoNo remains a good friend, so I am hoping to visit her in hiding, wherever she is. She has a great sense of humour, and we had some really funny times together. I would have to play her father whenever she needed to get out of a car to go to a restroom or something. Women cannot go anywhere unless accompanied by a venerable male relative. I felt I was really 'integrated' when doing this.  But one thing I should tell you about NoNo: She is from a long line of hookers. Her pimp is her mother. They are the top grade girls -- actresses, dancers, and the like. When her little scene of sucking off got out on the internet, this should not have happened. She would never have said yes to doing it if she’d known this. She was so angry when the Taliban threatened her with a jihad that she retaliated by putting out a CD of her song hits, and virtually everyone in Pakistan was listening to her songs. Her family was protecting her within the compound, where she was safe. Then one of the members of her own family was gotten to by the Taliban, and he came in and tried to kill her. She was stabbed twice but was able to fight him off very well, and other family members came to her aid. But now, after this, she feels not safe enough to continue he work. She knows she no longer has security, even within her own family.

Your film grows increasingly dark as it moves along (which is understandable). Instead of saving the best for the last, you've saved the worst. Your final words about a theater of terror, "a world where no one knows who's leading us into war, why we're going there, or if anyone has any vision of why we're doing it" reminded me of the film Gomorrah - with the Taliban taking the place of the mobsters. As in both cultures, there seems to have been an almost complete collapse of the Social Contract. (With the Taliban, it's more like: You do this for us now, and you'll have a great afterlife -- which, like almost all religions, is the ultimate con game.) Any thoughts on how and when the Pakistani people will get their day in the sun?

I have not seen Gomorrah.  I wanted to but missed it . Things got very dark when the Tariq Jamal movie was shut down.  By funding two dramas out of my own pocket I kept the lights on artificially. Obviously , I believe in the power of art or I would not be going back there to help set up the OXFAM project. The PPP, Benazir Bhutto's Party, which won the election after her death, had already done a deal with the Taliban to sacrifice the arts in a compromise that enabled other concessions. I had interviews with PPP about this and it was hard to make myself cut it from the movie. But this kind of knowledge is almost too much for a cinema audience, it is the kind of thing you'd explain in a book. I can also talk about it in interviews -- like this one -- that the film has stimulated.

I am much more worried about Pakistan drawing the world into a cataclysmic conflict of World War III-scale than I am about Afghanistan doing the same thing. It is a huge worry. I wish some decision-makers in the US and Europe would have the time to see Miscreants and ask me to bring some enlightened individuals from places like Peshawar University to some kind of think tank, so the problems could be looked at and possible solutions found. I am doing as much as I can. I have also helped create a scholarship scheme to get brilliant young women through University when they are from poor families that can not afford the fees, etc.

We thank George Gittoes and hope to meet him when he's in NYC for the MoMA screenings, at which we also hope some possible distributors show up.  This film is too important not to be released. Again: the MoMA screenings are February 18 at 8pm in the Titus 1 theater and February 19 at 4pm in Titus 2.


Several of Mr. Gittoes' films are now available via download at the following links: SOUNDTRACK TO WAR : http://mubi.com/films/33089
THE MISCREANTS OF TALLIWOOD : http://mubi.com/films/20628
RAMPAGE: http://mubi.com/films/33090

All photos are from the film itself, courtesy of Mr. Gittoes.