History Lessons

Barbara Hammer's History Lessons documentary played at the Kansas Film Festival on 09/10/05. The film is a documentary about Lesbians and their place in America. Ms. Hammer weaves a World War II documentary on female fighter pilots, newsreel footage of Eleanor Roosevelt and a heaping helping of 3 minute 8MM old Lesbian porn loops into a montage of images and stories about their place in our world; what's changed and what hasn't. Ms. Hammer had a Q&A after the film about how she picked the archival footage, how she managed to track down the old 8mm porn loops (extremely funny about buying porn loops in bulk - if you'll pardon the pun) and scanning the film loops to see which frames are most worn (which means they were played most) and inserting them into the movie. Plenty of nudity, lesbians everywhere and some really cool 1960's drive-in visual effects. Some of the old 20's porn is absolutely fascinating while the 60's porn with the girls with glasses, long straight hair and bell bottoms still is very hot. The film isn't a Stonewall outrage but a fun and playful exploration of a much more innocent time. Come on guys see the flick - its really good.