Twisted Arts Film Festival
Circle Cinema
Tulsa
Oct. 2 – 5, 2024
In 2021, Tulsa added two much-needed film festivals to its CV: the all-online Greenwood Film Festival, which debuted in the midst of the centennial of the Tulsa Race Massacre, and the Twisted Arts Film Festival, dedicated to promoting stories by and about the LGBTQ2S+ community. Both are still going strong in 2024.
Last week, Twisted Arts hosted its third annual festival at Circle Cinema, featuring a wide array of cinematic treats, including everything from cult classics to just-released independent short films. You might have heard of Twisted Arts’ recent “Drag Me to the Movies” events, which kick off with film parodies by local drag queens. This new tradition made its way to the festival for a special screening of Death Becomes Her. (Even if you don’t know the movie, you’re probably somewhat familiar with the image of Meryl Streep’s iconic villain and drag archetype, Madeline Ashton.)
Since its inaugural festival, Twisted Arts has made a name for itself as a local organization with a mission of “advancing, celebrating, elevating and amplifying LGBTQ2S+ artists by showcasing the best independent films, music, performances and all forms of mixed media.” They do this by spotlighting artists far and wide whose work embodies their values: community, education and originality.
On night one, Alexandra Kern’s Stud Country served as the appetizer to Melissa Etheridge: I’m Not Broken. Etheridge wasn’t able to make the event, but she did record a sweet welcome video for the festival, encouraging folks to attend the screening with director Amy Scott in attendance. “Without her beautiful heart and soul in this,” she said, “it would not be the amazing film that it is.”
One really cool aspect of a film festival like this: Even if you can’t attend, the lineup can still guide you. You can stream both the opening short (thanks to the LA Times) and the feature documentary (now available as a two-part docuseries on Paramount+) at home. Kern’s film is centered on the tradition of queer line dancing at venues like LA’s Oil Can Harry’s, one of the longest-running LGBTQ+ bars in the U.S. (1968 – 2021). It serves as both a celebration and a warning: “Sometimes when things get too complacent, they die,” says Anthony Ivancich, who taught line dancing at Oil Can Harry’s in the ’80s, stating exactly why we need organizations like Twisted Arts.
I’m Not Broken is a heartwarming look at Etheridge’s activism following the loss of her son to opioids and her experience with incarcerated women in her hometown of Topeka, Kansas. When these women start writing letters to Etheridge, she gets to know them and ultimately takes inspiration from their correspondence to write and perform a song for them. While Etheridge acknowledges that she can’t necessarily save anyone, she says in the film, “Best I can do is to be an example and maybe just a light that holds these people up and says, you matter.”
While the flexibility of streaming at home is a nice perk, there’s nothing quite like a night among the crowd at the movies. I loved the energy, the festival bustle, in the teeming theaters at Circle. After the screening of the Belgian-Canadian drama Turtles Saturday afternoon, front-row viewers praised the film and the festival as a whole. One man noted how he also loved Thursday’s screening of 13 Sentimentos, even though it was very different in mood (“not quite as sad as this one, but good”).
Before Turtles, Circle Cinema also hosted an opening celebration for its “Chasing Trains: A Rail Celebration” gallery exhibit, featuring a screening of the short film Train Time. It was a great commingling of both events and crowds, and it was a reminder of the diversity Tulsa has to offer, a key element of Twisted Arts’ mission. There really is something to celebrate in the sheer range the organization brought to the theater over these few days. Between seven feature films and seven shorts — including a collaboration with Tri-City Collective and Black Queer Tulsa on the screening of Grace—we saw burgeoning love, heartbreak, satire, fantasy, even musical numbers like Chuck, Chuck Baby, which screened Friday.
This was a different take on a traditional musical, in which the characters organically slip into singing/lip-syncing numbers from artists like Neil Diamond, Janis Ian and Lesley Duncan. It’s a joint from Welsh director Janis Pugh in which chicken-packer Helen is reintroduced to her childhood crush, Joanne, after her marriage to her husband ends and she’s left caring for his dying mother. It’s heavy but joyful, in large part thanks to the musical elements. I’ll be checking out more of Pugh’s work STAT.
It’s always nice to go to a movie, but it’s really fun to make an event of film. (And I haven’t even mentioned the afterparties at the Tulsa Eagle, Starlite, and Queen Rose Art House.) This year, as I’m sure is true of the previous years I missed, Twisted Arts hit a home run positioning film as way to highlight, protect and celebrate the communities we hold dear.
Next up for Twisted Arts:
Female Trouble
Dec. 5, 2024, 7:00 p.m.
Circle Cinema
