XINEMA is thrilled to present a duo of gender-defying films — a 2002 feature-length exotic pirate adventure and a 2013 short film, a tender homage to the Czech feminist filmmaker, Věra Chytilová.
Join us for a night of fantasy, strap-ons, and (pirate’s) booty.
Girl King (2002) Ileana Pietrobruno 80 min
With a fistful of fetish in every frame, Girl King delivers a sexy, drag king swashbuckler.
Pirates capture a naïve Butch and promise him that if he can find the Queen’s stolen treasure, they will be give him his heart’s desire—the seductive femme Claudia. Soon Butch is sailing on treacherous seas, swept away by dangerous desires where tops are bottomed, pirate captains are seduced by tranny sailors and cross-dressing femmes pack a wallop. With the help of the mysterious Easy and the infamous pirate Captain Candy, can Butch find the treasure in time to restore the natural attraction between butch and femme?
Decidedly tongue-in-cheek, this clever tale uses a pastiche of pillaged imagery to lead us into the uncharted oceans of dyke desire. A sweetly perverse fable for drag kings, gender-benders and those who adore them.
Advisory: this film contains graphic sexual imagery
& Rosa Rugosa (2013) Jaewoo Kang 5:44 min
Rosa Rugosa is a tender and thoughtful depiction of a gay man’s gender insecurities. Shot on 16mm film, a formal sensitivity is achieved at the core of the work. The marks and imperfections of film speaks to the self-reflexive examination of heteronormative desire through the narrator’s internal monologue.
Q&A with directors Ileana Pietrobruno and Jaewoo Kang
XINEMA is an ongoing series that showcases emerging and established experimental filmmakers within and around “Vancouver”, BC curated by Celina de Leon and Sidney Gordon. They aim to strengthen and preserve the experimental film scene by creating a space for open conversation, skill-sharing, and community.
Image: Jaewoo Kang, still from Rosa Rugosa, 2013, 16mm transferred to digital, 5:44 min.
Courtesy of the Artist.
Ileana Pietrobruno and Jaewood King
Canada
2023
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Also Playing
No Other Land
Deemed by many critics one of the essential films of 2024, a multiple festival award winner and Academy Award winner for Best Documentary, No Other Land is a reminder that mass expulsion is by no means a new reality for Palestinians.
Misericordia
Edgy, eccentric, and unapologetically queer, this film goes from drama to comedy without putting a foot wrong. Sex and murder are the subjects, and writer-director Alain Guiraudie (Stranger by the Lake) mines them for suspense and outrageous laughs.
The Way, My Way
All manner of pilgrims flock to France and Spain to walk the 800 km Camino de Santiago. One such is Bill, a stroppy sexagenarian Australian filmmaker who's determined to do the Camino with minimal prep, a dickey leg, and no firm idea why.
