Three queer short films hit the open road
Listen, I’m usually a war on cars, transit-wonk kind of person. But it would be hard for me, being from the United States, not to understand the symbolic functions that cars play in many stories when such narratives are all around me. Having the power to drive yourself can represent freedom and autonomy – potent themes for queer and trans folks stuck in bad situations or places where they cannot be themselves.
This week’s three shorts take a road trip to escape from where they are, whether physically or figuratively. Enjoy the ride!
“At one thousand feet, keep going.”
The Thing, written by Rhys Ernst and Avery McTaggart, and directed by Ernst, follows Tristan (Hilt Trollsplinter) and Zooey (Ruthie Doyle), a couple whose relationship has been distanced lately. Zooey wants time to reconnect with Tristan, and she finds it in the form of a mysterious attraction called “The Thing” that is a several-day’s drive from where they live. Their road trip, where they are accompanied by their cat, uncovers both the tensions in their relationship even as they obviously care for each other.
Director Rhys Ernst is perhaps best known for his role as a producer on the show Transparent and his directorial feature debut feature film Adam. The Thing, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, was his MFA thesis. “I don’t want to be sensationalist or reductive of trans stories in my filmmaking,” said Ernst in an interview with HuffPost. “Really, I am always trying figure out different ways of making art out of this ever-evolving dialogue with myself about the politics of gender identity.”
The Thing
“I keep having this dream that I’m driving down the highway in a white Mustang.”
Ponyboi, written by River Gallo, and directed by Gallo and Sadé Clacken Joseph, stars Gallo as the titular character, an intersex runaway, who works at a laundromat in New Jersey with his friend Sophie (Angel) and hustles as sex worker on the side. Ponyboi has a recurring dream about driving away from his life with a handsome, mysterious, magical cowboy. One day, the cowboy (Keith Allan) shows up the laundromat up to demonstrate to Ponyboi that his dreams of escape and love are not out of reach.
Ponyboi is the first narrative film ever created by and starring an out intersex person. “In a way it’s very humbling because I think the trans rights movement has really paved the way for intersex people to really step into our light and say ‘hey, we are also facing human rights violations’, and we can express that narrative in fiction in a way that also provides hope and some kind of solace,” creator River Gallo said in an interview with GLAAD. “I think what a lot of intersex people face is loneliness, feeling like we’re the only ones, doctors not telling us there’s an intersex community. To have that opportunity to let intersex people know that we’re here, we exist, we support you, that you’re now able to see yourself on the screen – I think that’s just monumental.” Gallo is currently in the process of turning Ponyboi into a feature film.
Ponyboi
“It will take about two days, I have to order it.”
In Carreteras | Roads, written and directed by Denisse Quintero, Carmela (Iazua Larios) lives in a small town with her grandfather (Tomihuatzi Xelhuantzi), where she leads a quiet life working at a shop. One day she meets Abril (Gimena Gómez), whose car breaks down in Carmela’s town, and invites Abril to stay with her while her car is getting fixed.
I was not able to find much about director Quintero except for this bio from when another of her films was screened at the Tribeca Film Festival: “She has won Fundación Carolina’s development grant, IMCINE’s screenwriting and development fund, Mix:Mexico short film contest and BoliviaLab. She’s grantholder of FONCA’s fellowship for The Ayapan Case and prepares her first feature fiction: The Return.”
Carreteras | Roads
