June 2011
ive always wanted a grandmother.
now i think i may informally have two.
“My father always used to say, “Don’t raise your voice. Improve your argument.” Good sense does not always lie with the loudest shouters, nor can we say that a large, unruly crowd is always the best arbiter of what is right.”
— Desmond Tutu
just got my ticket.-J*Davey New Designer Drug Tour.
Play
This Feels Like Traumacore… →
velvetparkmedia.com
I was invited to my friend Diana and her partner Em’s apartment to watch Lucía Puenzo’s latest film, The Fish Child, which I was told might be the Argentinean version of Bound. Little did I know I was in for a night of pure traumacore.
What is traumacore, you ask? Well, it’s one of the few first thoughts I was able to purge from my mouth after wondering what the fuck I just spent the last hour and a half watching. This film portrayed every aspect of trauma one could think of. You name it, and it was in there. Rape, child abuse, incest, animal cruelty, abortion, domestic violence, sexual coercion, suicide, murder, false imprisonment, and prostitution. And we sat and watched every melodramatic and non-linear edited minute of it. It was such an awkward experience that I found it slightly absurd and even laughed during some really intense moments. Was I nervous? Was it funny? Or was I just confused by it all?
Traumacore, as I see it, is a genre of film that focuses several plot points around deeply disturbing experience and/or emotional wounds that the characters have experienced. Many of the films that fall into this category use highly stylized effects, de-saturated colors and tones and feature spurts of dialogue in sullen tones, which creates an almost claustrophobic feeling for the viewer. It’s almost as if every set, every scene is contained within a very tight space. There is no time to really digest the trauma that you’ve seen occur because you are immediately confronted with the next trauma, which causes you to detach the traumatic event from the character who it is happening to. This is the disturbing aspect because one trauma often lends itself to having long-term effects on the person who experienced it. So imagine the experience of witnessing several traumas occur to one character in one film.
*article i wrote a few weeks ago that has been published on http://www.velvetparkmedia.com
UBLEP IndieGoGO Update #2 & Mailing Address
Update #2 has been sent to all of our donors. We are now 40% funded with 42 days to go!
We also now have a mailing address for those who want to correspond with us via snail mail.
c/o UBLEP
P.O. Box 42181
Philadelphia, PA 19101
fortunes.
It’s not what you know but what you USE of what you know that counts.
It is a great piece of skill to know how to guide your luck. Even while waiting for it.
‘Paula Brooks,’ editor of ‘Lez Get Real,’ also a man →
washingtonpost.com
*this shit is getting out of hand!
