BFI Flare: Queering the Archive

 Almost a week into the festival and I have finally completed a feature! And what a film! Ultraviolette and the Blood Spitters Gang is a French art doc with an extraordinary backstory. Director Robin Hunzinger collaborated with his mother Claudie to tell the story of Emma and Marcelle, two young women who met in 1923 and had a love affair which played out in the latter stages in letters sent by Marcelle to Emma (Robin's grandmother and Claudie's mother). After Emma's death, the two descendants found the letters and have used them to narrate this beautifully realised, affecting story of persistent desire. 

It took me awhile to realise most of the images were not of the two lovers but from found footage also also from art films. I recognised scenes from Meshes of the Afternoon and Mädchen in Uniform but the credits revealed work by Leger, Dulac and Moholy-Nagy as well. It's a bold move to drop those into such a personal story. I also admired the strong use of archive footage, the queering of images of women in the countryside, women dancing, women on bicycles, women wearing ties. This was truly a queering of the archive. 

Separated by work and academic commitments, Marcelle writes passionately about her feelings for Emma but also about her own life philosophy, stating she has "le goût de la vie". Diagnosed with tuberculosis, she finds herself confined to a sanatorium, where she meets three other rebellious young women and the four of them form a gang. A very queer gang. Marcelle, despite her love for Emma, is quite happy to play the seducer and even brags about it in her letters. Who knew a sanatorium could be such a pick-up joint, especially in 1928?

There are resonances for current day concerns: young women lying in beds in close proximity, attended by doctors, none of them wearing masks. Young women facing death from a communicable illness. Marcelle writes of her friends facing death, which she refuses. She wonders if a lost friend will return to visit. She has the most brilliant way with words, and one wonders if she went on to become a writer, as one of her friends did. 

Needless to say, there can be no really happy ending, not with fatal illness and impending world war. I felt shaken at the end and thrilled to have made the acquaintance of such vibrant beings from another time.

Into the Archive

As I have been delving into my archive of interviews (the results to appear on Odd Girl Out and some day in more concrete form), I have experienced a full spectrum of emotions, from admiration to despair. From "Wow! I can't believe she said that!" to "Oh, My God, that tape hiss is appalling!".

Generally, it runs along the lines of good substance, terrible style. I haven't always been able to afford good quality tape, and though my trusty Sony Walkman (date of birth: 1986) is still holding up well, the recordings aren't always vintage. I am planning on investing in a good digital recorder, but have yet to find anything affordable that records in stereo. Suggestions welcome.

But, it is a long-long-LONG-term project. Today, I am in 1993, visiting London for a week (ah, what a life-changing trip that was) and meeting Tanya Donelly, Thalia Zedek and Bikini Kill on tour. The Walkman was behaving well, but perhaps running a bit slowly, as Kathleen Hanna sounds a bit chirpier than usual. Thankfully, that can be easily fixed with a tweak of the Speed Tune.

Not so the 1996 interview with Ellyott Dragon, which popped into the tape player, ran for five seconds and then stopped. Snapped tape. Now WTF do I do? Any further suggestions welcome. Surely, history cannot be erased by a flimsy tape. Can it?