New Jersey Film Festival and the Rutgers Film Co-Op is sponsoring a number of Queer programs the weekend of the 1999 Tri-State Bi Conference. Gods and Monsters on Fri and Sat, and Hapiness on Sunday.
Admission: $5 General; $4 Rutgers Film Co-op / NJMAC Friends
Tickets: Tickets are available on a "first-come-first-served" basis and can be purchased at the door beginning a half-hour before showtime.
| Fr-2/5 and again Sat-2/6 | Gods and Monsters | ||
| Bill Condon | 1998 | 105 min. | Scott Hall Room 123 |
| Filtering fact through fiction, Gods and Monsters restages the life of James Whale, the British film director who created the 1931 Frankenstein and died in an apparent suicide in his Hollywood pool in 1957. played by Ian McKellen, in a performance of immense dignity and feeling, Whale is a melancholy recluse enlivening the end of his days by spinning out fantasies around a young pool boy (Brendan Fraser). The working class Boone is fascinated by his employer's stories of old Hollywood, and wary of the man's sexual advances. though separated by age, class and desires, Whale and Boone forge a tentative friendship based on their unexpected commonalities. Whale gradually casts himself as Dr. Frankenstein and stages a plot with Boone as the new "monster". | |||
| Su-2/7 | Hapiness | ||
| Todd Solondz | 1998 | 134 min. | State Theater |
| Controversial and uncensored, Hapiness -- from the director of Welcomr to the Dollhouse -- takes us into the seemingly banal territory of a New Jersey suburb. The lives of three sisters, their parents, friends and neighbours intersect in this black comedy of missed connections. On the surface, they diligently seek companionship, love and stability, yet gradually and inexorably, darker forces bubble from below the thin veneer of normalcy, eventually taking over their lives. the great power of this uncompromising film is to bring us close to characters who become increasingly horrific yet remain familiar. | |||