Paris Is Burning

Alternate title(s):
Foreign Title:
Date: January 01, 1990 to December 31, 1990
Dates Note: 1990
Country of Origin: United States
Place of Origin: United States
Languages:
Color: Color
Silent: No
Based On:
Additional Info:

Preserved by the Criterion Collection/Janus Films in conjunction with Outfest, Sundance Institute, and UCLA Film & Television Archive

Curator Notes

Film Series/Exhibition Title: 
Pioneers of Queer Cinema
Description: 

For the queer and trans Black and Latinx subjects in Jennie Livingston’s documentary of New York’s Ballroom scene in the late 1980s, the community formed around the competitive world of drag was a matter of survival. Made over the course of seven years, the film ignited controversy upon its release. Yet Livingston’s nuanced and compassionate filmmaking enabled their subjects to speak at length, so that, as Essex Hemphill observed in 1991, “the authentic voice of this community emerges unfettered.”

Authors/Roles: 
Brendan Lucas

Related People

  • Person: 
    Jennie Livingston
    Role: director
    Person: 
    Paul Gibson
    Role: cinematographer
    Person: 
    Brooke Xtravaganza
    Role: actors
    Person: 
    André Christian
    Role: actors
    Person: 
    Dorian Corey
    Role: actors
    Person: 
    Paris Duprée
    Role: actors
    Person: 
    Pepper LaBeija
    Role: actors