After a 2 year hiatus due to COVID, QDoc was back in 2022!..

Q & A with subject Brent Nicholson Earle & Producer Alex Charner  followed screening.

This emotionally-charged documentary blends stage performance with stock footage to highlight the remarkable life and work of AIDS activist Brent Nicholson Earle. At the height of the epidemic, Earle refused to watch his friends suffer due to government inaction and public ignorance about the disease. His audacious response in 1986 was to embark on a 10,000-mile run around the perimeter of the United States to draw attention to the plight of AIDS patients, all while overcoming public backlash, a homophobic media blackout, his own health challenges, and an inconvenient lack of any long-distance training. 

Uýra is the alter-ego of Emerson, a non-binary performance artist and ecologist of indigenous origin living in Manaus, Brazil. Marginalized as an Indigenous, queer, and trans person, Uýra travels through the Amazon on a journey of self-discovery using performance art and exquisite transformations -- often created from materials found in the nearby forest -- to spread their message of environmental protection and promote LGTBQ+ rights. This independent film was made by women, queer, indigenous, black, and other underrepresented Latin American voices.  

Illuminating the closely-held secrets of a tight-lipped industry still ruled by capitalism, patriarchy, and white supremacy, Body Parts uncovers the often invisible processes involved in creating intimacy for mainstream American film and television, the toll these scenes exact on those directly involved. The documentary features candid interviews with actors and creators who are advocating for change, including Jane Fonda, Rosanna Arquette, Joey Soloway, Angela Robinson, Karyn Kusama, Rose McGowan, Alexandra Billings, Emily Meade, and David Simon. It highlights the voices of women like Sarah Scott and Sarah Tither-Kaplan who bravely spoke out against abusive behavior on their sets, were punished for it, and helped spark lasting improvements at major studios, including the groundbreaking introduction of intimacy coordinators

Q & A with Director Lauretta Molitor followed screening.

It’s impossible to imagine San Francisco’s queer cultural life in the past 5 decades without the singular presence of trailblazing gay filmmaker and organizer Marc Huestis. His most profound impact was as a creator of extravaganzas—some to support community causes, and later star-studded events which brought together the best of San Francisco’s performance community in celebration of camp icons and revered movies. 

Impresario is a celebratory, and sometimes bittersweet, portrait of Marc, lovingly crafted by first-time director Lauretta Molitor, and including interviews with Mx Justin Vivian Bond, John Cameron Mitchell, David Weissman and more.

Q&A with Directors Bryan Darling & Jesse Finley Reed  followed screening.

Leopard print loin cloths, macramé blouses, silk kimonos, spandex bikinis: International Male was the mail-order catalogue that launched a thousand wet dreams with its flamboyant fashions and beefcake models. After Gene Burkard created the “Jock Sock,” he set up shop in his San Diego cottage and put out the first catalog in 1976. The ensuing phenomenon was something no one could have predicted. For over three decades, the iconic catalogue transformed not only men’s fashion but also the American public’s perception of masculinity and sexuality.

Q&A with Subject Professor Michael Angelo Roberson followed screening.

Do all Black lives matter, or only heterosexual Black lives? This is the question theater and film director Micheal Rice powerfully explores in this deep, necessary dive into the intertwined damage of racism and homophobia within Black communities. 

BLACK AS U R unveils the stark homophobia characterizing many Black spaces, both contemporary and autobiographical, via a look into the director’s own upbringing in the southern United States. The film brings to the forefront the all-too-often silenced conversation within the Black community for generations -- Black queerness and transgender identity. BLACK AS U R explores topics that have catalyzed mental and physical violence against a subset of the Black community who have largely been the leaders in cultural expansion and the fight against racial injustice in America. 

Five fantastic short docs celebrating the unique and bold stories of our diverse community.

Film 1: BEIRUT DREAMS IN COLOR, 29 mins

Film 2: HOLDING MOSES, 17 mins

Film 3: LOVE, BARBARA, 13 mins

Film 4: ALLISON WONDER, MASTER OF DOLLS,10 mins 

Film 5: NEVER LOOK AWAY, 15 mins 

Q&A with Subject Harry Cullen, Producer Shanti Avirgan, Mike Gilbert - Portland Peoples Outreach Project, and Health Justice Recovery Alliance Executive Director Tera Hurst followed screening.

An epic, emotional and interconnected story about internationally renowned artist and activist Nan Goldin told through her slideshows, intimate interviews, ground-breaking photography, and rare footage of her personal fight to hold the Sackler family, whose company Purdue Pharma ignited the opioid epidemic with its blockbuster drug OxyContin, accountable for the opioid crisis.

Directed by Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras, the film interweaves Goldin’s past and present, the deeply personal and urgently political, from P.A.I.N.’s (a group Goldin founded to shame museums into rejecting Sackler money) actions at renowned art institutions, to Goldin’s photography of her friends and peers through her epic “The Ballad of Sexual Dependency” and her legendary 1989, NEA-censored AIDS exhibition, “Witness: Against Our Vanishing.”

At the core of the film are Goldin’s art works. In these works, Goldin captures her friendships with beauty and raw tenderness. These friendships, and the legacy of her sister Barbara, anchor all of Goldin’s art.