At the beginning of Martine Syms’s debut narrative feature, sculptor Palace (Diamond Stingily, also an artist in real life) is shown receiving her MFA from an art school in upstate New York. Four white faculty members bestow the honor, but only after offering a range of supercilious (some even outright racist) critiques and patronizing banalities. This kicks off Palace’s final 24 hours as an exhausted graduate student, who vows to skip the end-of-summer party but instead finds herself drawn to the debauchery. Syms’s work—which ranges from performance art to gallery installations to this more straightforward narrative endeavor—is compelled by a preternaturally propulsive energy that sustains its momentum even as she explores various forms of expression. As Palace navigates her final day at the college, Syms inserts multimedia quirks into the coming-of-age proceedings, such as when Palace, doing her makeup for the night, assumes the peculiar dialect of a social media influencer filming a tutorial; trenchant memes occasionally pop up in the top right corner of the screen, flashing by so quick as to be illegible but hilarious nonetheless. It’s through these means that the film offers wry commentary on everything from undecipherable artspeak to racism. (An exchange between Palace and a faculty member extolling the virtues of a rapper he heard an interview with on NPR’s Fresh Air, to which Palace replies “What’s Fresh Air?,” is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a film all year.) Cowritten by Syms and Rocket Caleshu, its script is so good as to seem unwritten, the stuff of real-life folly; Stingily’s performance is similarly ingenious. 97 min.

Gene Siskel Film Center

Read More

After protests in many major American cities shook the country’s establishment in the mid-60s, Lyndon Johnson assembled what would come to be known as the Kerner Commission (after Illinois governor Otto Kerner, who headed it) to study and recommend solutions to the racial and economic issues that inspired the widespread unrest. Their report, published by Bantam Books in paperback, quickly became a bestseller. But the sweeping reforms the commission called for were mostly ignored, except for a line item toward the end to boost funding for law enforcement. Some of this new money went to the construction of model towns on army bases in Virginia and Georgia. Dubbed “Riotsville,” they were stage sets where police departments and the military playacted command and control tactics to quell inner-city turmoil, complete with bleachers full of officers and politicians cheering and laughing as soldiers dressed as “hooligans” and “rabble-rousers” got their heads bashed in and helicopters clouded all of the ersatz Main Street with tear gas.

Sierra Pettengill’s disquieting documentary uses only archival footage shot by the military and clips from period news coverage to explore this uncanny episode in the country’s history. As fake as the towns and protestors obviously were, the training law enforcement groups received in these Riotsvilles was all too real. Their violent strategies to snuff out unrest outside the Republican convention in Miami and the Democratic one in Chicago in 1968 were taught on those sets. While Pettengill’s sympathy for the largely left-wing activists and community organizers is clear, her use of strictly period footage that has rarely screened before—and certainly never for a wide audience such as a major broadcast network—lends her film a depth that would’ve been absent if she presented a bunch of contemporary talking heads explaining the flaws and lapses of the establishment. These odd, sometimes amateurish frames put the viewer back into that tumultuous time in a way that no amount of outraged words ever could. 91 min.

Gene Siskel Film Center

Read More

In the romantic comedy Bros, Bobby (Billy Eichner) recently expanded his career as a LGBTQ+ history podcast host into lead curator of the first major LGBTQ+ museum in New York. After a meet-cute of sorts with not-his-usual-type Aaron (Luke Macfarlane), Bobby struggles to pair his feelings with his self-described permanently single lifestyle. 

Written by Eichner and longtime comedy veteran Nicholas Stoller, and directed by Stoller, Bros toes the line between genuine moments of sweetness and acerbically cutting sarcastic wit. Modes of relationships differ, and Bros is comfortable in highlighting those differences for all their joys and faults. 

Where the film truly succeeds is in its ability to deftly balance universal experience with individuality. While there are obviously commonalities between the romantic experiences of gay and straight people across gender identities, or even more narrowly between cis white men as a subcategory, the diversity of specific experience is critical to Eichner’s script, as even within narrow categories there are vastly varied modes of interaction, openness, and perspective. Of course, finding shared experience and opening oneself up to be surprised by those who fall outside of our initial expectations is a common trope in romantic comedies, but Eichner and Stoller’s script is inventive enough to expand the trope in entertaining ways, and Macfarlane brings depth of performance to a character that could otherwise fall into cliché. 

Ultimately, Bros is a genuinely funny movie with nuanced emotional heft. It’s a refreshing and vulnerable take on the genre from a perspective so rarely seen in Hollywood filmmaking and a reminder of the joy and laughter that’s there to be found in the chaotic minutia of human relationships if we’re open to finding it. R, 115 min.

Wide release in theaters

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“We’re Bikini Kill and we want revolution girl-style now!” roared punk feminist frontwoman Kathleen Hanna at a 1991 Bikini Kill performance of their song “Double Dare Ya.” What started as a war cry during their riotous live shows—demanding liberation from sexual harassment, gendered violence, and the shadowy tendrils of capitalism—quickly cemented into a mantra for a new generation of alt-queer punks and riot grrrls.

Director, editor, and producer Maria Breaux taps into the bratty ferocity and cries for revolution of the 1990s riot grrrl movement with her crowdfunded feature film Vulveeta, premiering as part of the 40th iteration of Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film Festival. 

Vulveeta feels spiritually indebted to the improvised mockumentary style popularized by Christopher Guest and Rob Reiner’s 1984 comedy This Is Spinal Tap, which documents self-serious English rockers Spinal Tap as they tour in promotion of their salacious new album Sniff the Glove. Breaux’s San Francisco-set comedy rewrites the subgenre with queer BIPOC verve, featuring original songs recorded by the cast and a soundtrack from scene staples like Bratmobile, Tribe 8, The Homobiles, and Bikini Kill. 

The title was inspired by a long-running joke between StormMiguel Florez (coproducer and editor who plays the character Gordonx Garcia) and a friend he’d met while playing in a lesbian rock band in early 90s Albuquerque, New Mexico. “My best friend Fara would always joke that she had a band she’d call Vulveeta and she would start talking about her band as if it existed . . . I started feeding the rumor mill anytime somebody would miss my show,” Florez said.

Eventually, people within the community buzzed about the enigmatic invented band, with Florez cheekily telling friends who just missed his shows that they didn’t catch their incredible opening act Vulveeta. By the time Breaux was deciding on a name for the film, Florez suggested—with permission—the long-fabled Albuquerque jest.

Vulveeta stars Breaux as narcissist punk rocker Grrrilda Beausoleil, who abruptly abandoned the titular 90s riot grrrl band as they teased the edge of notoriety. Now 20 years later with a documentary crew in tow, Grrrilda’s turning 50 and wants to rally the troops once more for a reunion show, but a lot has changed from the days of stickering and zine-making.

Grrrilda’s become something of a new age punk. “She’s done all these healing modalities, from going to Peru on an Ayahuasca retreat to past life regressions—but still on the verge of having a meltdown at any moment and so on,” Breaux said.

Bass guitarist Jett Groan (J Aguilar) is more than willing to let bygones be bygones and get the band back together, perhaps if only to languish after Grrrilda. Killer Child (Dakota Billops-Breaux)—previously the two-year-old drummer for the punk unit (nothing more hardcore than hiring a baby to blitzkrieg the drums)—is now in her early 20s and goes by the name KC. She’s taking a gap year from college due to a “lack of funds” and Vulveeta’s hasty reunion may just be her ticket out of her latest gig in lawn furniture upkeep. 

Not everyone is eager about Grrrilda’s return. Rhythm guitarist and avid dog-enthusiast Gordonx is still bitter about the breakup, having to pick up the pieces of Vulveeta after Grrrilda’s swift exit. And former bandmate Susan Strapp (Ruby Goldberg) wants absolutely nothing to do with the band, telling Grrrilda’s film crew through her apartment intercom to piss off and stay away. 

Alongside their money-centered manager (Lydia Tremayne) and their newest, nerves-ridden backing vocalist Harriet (Sarah Korda), Vulveeta prepares for their reconciliation show as they skewer the progressive feminist punk movement, new age aphorisms, and Bay Area culture with sincerity and grit.

Breaux even snags cameos from Lynn Breedlove of the queer Californian ride-sharing service and band of the same name The Homobiles, and Alison Wolfe of Bratmobile, music journalist and cofounder of the riot grrrl movement.

“I didn’t want to co-opt a movement, you know?” Breaux said. “I wasn’t quite part of the movement and it was important for me to hear from leaders and someone that was an expert in that perspective—to honor the musicians.” 

Vulveeta93 min.The 40th edition of Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film FestivalStream online Sept. 30-Oct. 6; $10

Riot grrrl began as a political movement and music scene in 1991 when women from Washington, D.C., and Olympia, Washington, got together to address the long-standing sexism and harassment they received from the primarily white male punk scene. The Riot Grrrl Manifesto was published that same year in Bikini Kill’s second fanzine, a call to arms for women to upend the male domain of punk rock and establish safe spaces for women free from harassment. What followed was a half-decade-long revolution in which riot grrrls raised consciousness through handmade fanzines and distributed their music on cassettes and CDs with DIY tactility.

Aguilar recalls being on the peripheries of the movement, even cutting and pasting together a couple zines using photocopies from the long-extinct Kinko’s. “I tried to steal some photocopies; we would sneak in there and make the zines and hand them out at shows,” they said.

Florez connected with riot grrrl’s aesthetics and practicality. “Even though I wasn’t as connected with the riot grrrl scene, I was definitely connected to a lot of queer scenes and people doing DIY . . . so I definitely had those influences,” Florez said.

Vulveeta influences stretch beyond the 90s punk sensibility, indebted to the slow cultural shift away from the studio audience sitcom towards the cinéma vérité-inspired mockumentary comedy, complete with talking heads and colorful confessionals.

Breaux attributes the broad appeal of the mockumentary to “so many years of reality TV under our belts culturally.” Seminal reality shows like The Real World and Keeping Up with the Kardashians mined the facet of their subjects’ perceptual awareness for layered comedy and occasional depth, while mockumentaries like The Office (both the UK and American productions), Modern Family, and Parks and Recreation propelled those farcical elements into greater popular culture.

Breaux says she and the cast discovered that same freedom Christopher Guest found within his improvisational comedies, allowing them to move past the specificities of the dialogue, open up, and just play.

It’s fitting then that Breaux uses the mockumentary genre for her improvised spoof, which feels tailor-made for underdogs, the undermined, and those seeking redemption. But the queer revolution isn’t destined to stick to this script forever. Aguilar believes this is only the beginning for independent cinema made for and by queer people of color.

“Whether it’s a mockumentary or any kind of genre, we’re [LGBTQ+ people] ready to be at the center,” Aguilar said. “Finally, we’re ready for it.”

Read More

Nobody makes eating fresh pasta at home easier than Tony Quartaro. Since I wrote about him last summer, the former Formento’s chef installed his roving fresh pasta delivery service Gemma Foods into a permanent Grand Avenue brick-and-mortar. Now you can watch your farro mafaldine rolled out and cut in the window, take it home, and plate it up in your own kitchen with creamy mushroom ragù, just like Chef Quartaro.

Maybe not exactly like him. Before he led pasta programs at the Bristol, Balena, and Formento’s, he paid his dues in the San Francisco pasta palace A16, so you might have a bit to learn. And sure, you can get canestri alla vodka or bucatini cacio e pepe plated up hot at Gemma’s stall at Time Out Market, but the man is busy bringing pasta to all the people. He delegates that.

There’s only one time and place where Quartaro’s going to personally spool out a tangle of collard green linguine with fresh razor clams in a pool of warming poblano brodo for you alone, and that’s at Monday Night Foodball, the Reader’s weekly chef pop-up at the Kedzie Inn.

Corretto. This October 3, Quartaro takes over the kitchen at the Kedzie Inn with a seasonal menu that demonstrates the wide breadth of Gemma’s fresh pasta portfolio.

But you’ll want to start with Gemma’s “famous meatballs” with giardiniera focaccia. “A16 was like ‘Meatball University,’” says Quartaro. “‘Ball So Hard University,’ so to speak.”

He’s bringing tortelloni stuffed with koginut squash from Frillman Farms, in sage brown butter sauce and balsamico, showered with squash seeds prepped in the style of the crumbled amaretti cookies you’d eat this dish with in Tuscany. He’s gently braising chuck flap to pull and roll up in the braciole with caciocavallo, Sicilian oregano, and chile bread crumbs; and he’s smoking Nichols Farm Yukon Gold potatoes to fill the Sardinian-style culurgione hole in your heart, with lemon and sage cream sauce (“You can just tip that back and drink it,” he says). And then there’s that spicy take on linguine in clam sauce, sprinkled with lemon bread crumbs, the poor man’s Parmigiano. Maybe you’ll even take home a pasta kit or two, to coax out your inner Tony.

It’s an evening of exquisite pastabilities starting at 5 PM this Monday at 4100 N. Kedzie. Limited walk-in orders will be available, but secure your full load of fresh carbs now by preordering.

Meantime, feast your eyes on the full fall Monday Night Foodball schedule, now with Laos to Your House.

Kirk WilliamsonRead More

At the beginning of Martine Syms’s debut narrative feature, sculptor Palace (Diamond Stingily, also an artist in real life) is shown receiving her MFA from an art school in upstate New York. Four white faculty members bestow the honor, but only after offering a range of supercilious (some even outright racist) critiques and patronizing banalities. This kicks off Palace’s final 24 hours as an exhausted graduate student, who vows to skip the end-of-summer party but instead finds herself drawn to the debauchery. Syms’s work—which ranges from performance art to gallery installations to this more straightforward narrative endeavor—is compelled by a preternaturally propulsive energy that sustains its momentum even as she explores various forms of expression. As Palace navigates her final day at the college, Syms inserts multimedia quirks into the coming-of-age proceedings, such as when Palace, doing her makeup for the night, assumes the peculiar dialect of a social media influencer filming a tutorial; trenchant memes occasionally pop up in the top right corner of the screen, flashing by so quick as to be illegible but hilarious nonetheless. It’s through these means that the film offers wry commentary on everything from undecipherable artspeak to racism. (An exchange between Palace and a faculty member extolling the virtues of a rapper he heard an interview with on NPR’s Fresh Air, to which Palace replies “What’s Fresh Air?,” is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a film all year.) Cowritten by Syms and Rocket Caleshu, its script is so good as to seem unwritten, the stuff of real-life folly; Stingily’s performance is similarly ingenious. 97 min.

Gene Siskel Film Center

Read More

After protests in many major American cities shook the country’s establishment in the mid-60s, Lyndon Johnson assembled what would come to be known as the Kerner Commission (after Illinois governor Otto Kerner, who headed it) to study and recommend solutions to the racial and economic issues that inspired the widespread unrest. Their report, published by Bantam Books in paperback, quickly became a bestseller. But the sweeping reforms the commission called for were mostly ignored, except for a line item toward the end to boost funding for law enforcement. Some of this new money went to the construction of model towns on army bases in Virginia and Georgia. Dubbed “Riotsville,” they were stage sets where police departments and the military playacted command and control tactics to quell inner-city turmoil, complete with bleachers full of officers and politicians cheering and laughing as soldiers dressed as “hooligans” and “rabble-rousers” got their heads bashed in and helicopters clouded all of the ersatz Main Street with tear gas.

Sierra Pettengill’s disquieting documentary uses only archival footage shot by the military and clips from period news coverage to explore this uncanny episode in the country’s history. As fake as the towns and protestors obviously were, the training law enforcement groups received in these Riotsvilles was all too real. Their violent strategies to snuff out unrest outside the Republican convention in Miami and the Democratic one in Chicago in 1968 were taught on those sets. While Pettengill’s sympathy for the largely left-wing activists and community organizers is clear, her use of strictly period footage that has rarely screened before—and certainly never for a wide audience such as a major broadcast network—lends her film a depth that would’ve been absent if she presented a bunch of contemporary talking heads explaining the flaws and lapses of the establishment. These odd, sometimes amateurish frames put the viewer back into that tumultuous time in a way that no amount of outraged words ever could. 91 min.

Gene Siskel Film Center

Read More

In the romantic comedy Bros, Bobby (Billy Eichner) recently expanded his career as a LGBTQ+ history podcast host into lead curator of the first major LGBTQ+ museum in New York. After a meet-cute of sorts with not-his-usual-type Aaron (Luke Macfarlane), Bobby struggles to pair his feelings with his self-described permanently single lifestyle. 

Written by Eichner and longtime comedy veteran Nicholas Stoller, and directed by Stoller, Bros toes the line between genuine moments of sweetness and acerbically cutting sarcastic wit. Modes of relationships differ, and Bros is comfortable in highlighting those differences for all their joys and faults. 

Where the film truly succeeds is in its ability to deftly balance universal experience with individuality. While there are obviously commonalities between the romantic experiences of gay and straight people across gender identities, or even more narrowly between cis white men as a subcategory, the diversity of specific experience is critical to Eichner’s script, as even within narrow categories there are vastly varied modes of interaction, openness, and perspective. Of course, finding shared experience and opening oneself up to be surprised by those who fall outside of our initial expectations is a common trope in romantic comedies, but Eichner and Stoller’s script is inventive enough to expand the trope in entertaining ways, and Macfarlane brings depth of performance to a character that could otherwise fall into cliché. 

Ultimately, Bros is a genuinely funny movie with nuanced emotional heft. It’s a refreshing and vulnerable take on the genre from a perspective so rarely seen in Hollywood filmmaking and a reminder of the joy and laughter that’s there to be found in the chaotic minutia of human relationships if we’re open to finding it. R, 115 min.

Wide release in theaters

Read More

“We’re Bikini Kill and we want revolution girl-style now!” roared punk feminist frontwoman Kathleen Hanna at a 1991 Bikini Kill performance of their song “Double Dare Ya.” What started as a war cry during their riotous live shows—demanding liberation from sexual harassment, gendered violence, and the shadowy tendrils of capitalism—quickly cemented into a mantra for a new generation of alt-queer punks and riot grrrls.

Director, editor, and producer Maria Breaux taps into the bratty ferocity and cries for revolution of the 1990s riot grrrl movement with her crowdfunded feature film Vulveeta, premiering as part of the 40th iteration of Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film Festival. 

Vulveeta feels spiritually indebted to the improvised mockumentary style popularized by Christopher Guest and Rob Reiner’s 1984 comedy This Is Spinal Tap, which documents self-serious English rockers Spinal Tap as they tour in promotion of their salacious new album Sniff the Glove. Breaux’s San Francisco-set comedy rewrites the subgenre with queer BIPOC verve, featuring original songs recorded by the cast and a soundtrack from scene staples like Bratmobile, Tribe 8, The Homobiles, and Bikini Kill. 

The title was inspired by a long-running joke between StormMiguel Florez (coproducer and editor who plays the character Gordonx Garcia) and a friend he’d met while playing in a lesbian rock band in early 90s Albuquerque, New Mexico. “My best friend Fara would always joke that she had a band she’d call Vulveeta and she would start talking about her band as if it existed . . . I started feeding the rumor mill anytime somebody would miss my show,” Florez said.

Eventually, people within the community buzzed about the enigmatic invented band, with Florez cheekily telling friends who just missed his shows that they didn’t catch their incredible opening act Vulveeta. By the time Breaux was deciding on a name for the film, Florez suggested—with permission—the long-fabled Albuquerque jest.

Vulveeta stars Breaux as narcissist punk rocker Grrrilda Beausoleil, who abruptly abandoned the titular 90s riot grrrl band as they teased the edge of notoriety. Now 20 years later with a documentary crew in tow, Grrrilda’s turning 50 and wants to rally the troops once more for a reunion show, but a lot has changed from the days of stickering and zine-making.

Grrrilda’s become something of a new age punk. “She’s done all these healing modalities, from going to Peru on an Ayahuasca retreat to past life regressions—but still on the verge of having a meltdown at any moment and so on,” Breaux said.

Bass guitarist Jett Groan (J Aguilar) is more than willing to let bygones be bygones and get the band back together, perhaps if only to languish after Grrrilda. Killer Child (Dakota Billops-Breaux)—previously the two-year-old drummer for the punk unit (nothing more hardcore than hiring a baby to blitzkrieg the drums)—is now in her early 20s and goes by the name KC. She’s taking a gap year from college due to a “lack of funds” and Vulveeta’s hasty reunion may just be her ticket out of her latest gig in lawn furniture upkeep. 

Not everyone is eager about Grrrilda’s return. Rhythm guitarist and avid dog-enthusiast Gordonx is still bitter about the breakup, having to pick up the pieces of Vulveeta after Grrrilda’s swift exit. And former bandmate Susan Strapp (Ruby Goldberg) wants absolutely nothing to do with the band, telling Grrrilda’s film crew through her apartment intercom to piss off and stay away. 

Alongside their money-centered manager (Lydia Tremayne) and their newest, nerves-ridden backing vocalist Harriet (Sarah Korda), Vulveeta prepares for their reconciliation show as they skewer the progressive feminist punk movement, new age aphorisms, and Bay Area culture with sincerity and grit.

Breaux even snags cameos from Lynn Breedlove of the queer Californian ride-sharing service and band of the same name The Homobiles, and Alison Wolfe of Bratmobile, music journalist and cofounder of the riot grrrl movement.

“I didn’t want to co-opt a movement, you know?” Breaux said. “I wasn’t quite part of the movement and it was important for me to hear from leaders and someone that was an expert in that perspective—to honor the musicians.” 

Vulveeta93 min.The 40th edition of Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film FestivalStream online Sept. 30-Oct. 6; $10

Riot grrrl began as a political movement and music scene in 1991 when women from Washington, D.C., and Olympia, Washington, got together to address the long-standing sexism and harassment they received from the primarily white male punk scene. The Riot Grrrl Manifesto was published that same year in Bikini Kill’s second fanzine, a call to arms for women to upend the male domain of punk rock and establish safe spaces for women free from harassment. What followed was a half-decade-long revolution in which riot grrrls raised consciousness through handmade fanzines and distributed their music on cassettes and CDs with DIY tactility.

Aguilar recalls being on the peripheries of the movement, even cutting and pasting together a couple zines using photocopies from the long-extinct Kinko’s. “I tried to steal some photocopies; we would sneak in there and make the zines and hand them out at shows,” they said.

Florez connected with riot grrrl’s aesthetics and practicality. “Even though I wasn’t as connected with the riot grrrl scene, I was definitely connected to a lot of queer scenes and people doing DIY . . . so I definitely had those influences,” Florez said.

Vulveeta influences stretch beyond the 90s punk sensibility, indebted to the slow cultural shift away from the studio audience sitcom towards the cinéma vérité-inspired mockumentary comedy, complete with talking heads and colorful confessionals.

Breaux attributes the broad appeal of the mockumentary to “so many years of reality TV under our belts culturally.” Seminal reality shows like The Real World and Keeping Up with the Kardashians mined the facet of their subjects’ perceptual awareness for layered comedy and occasional depth, while mockumentaries like The Office (both the UK and American productions), Modern Family, and Parks and Recreation propelled those farcical elements into greater popular culture.

Breaux says she and the cast discovered that same freedom Christopher Guest found within his improvisational comedies, allowing them to move past the specificities of the dialogue, open up, and just play.

It’s fitting then that Breaux uses the mockumentary genre for her improvised spoof, which feels tailor-made for underdogs, the undermined, and those seeking redemption. But the queer revolution isn’t destined to stick to this script forever. Aguilar believes this is only the beginning for independent cinema made for and by queer people of color.

“Whether it’s a mockumentary or any kind of genre, we’re [LGBTQ+ people] ready to be at the center,” Aguilar said. “Finally, we’re ready for it.”

Read More