Out Takes

14 Jan 2016

Homosexual Representation on the Big Screen

Arts, TV & Film

This week on Out Takes we usher in the new year by asking:

1. how homosexuality is represented on our screens, and
2. how that representation informs homosexual identity.

These are big questions so Dennis Altman, author of Homosexual: Oppression and Liberation, joins us to co-host. His work has been called ‘sensitive’ and ‘penetrating’ by the New York Times. Taking our cues from Altman’s work, we look first at the cinematic era of homosexual oppression: how was sexuality hinted at on screen?

And how do films like Suddenly Last Summer and Tea and Sympathy mediate homosexuality without explicit reference to sexual mores? Then we turn our attention to on screen representations of liberation. In particular we look at Angels in America, which uses homosexual identity as a metonym for border cultural and political change, and the tension that change engenders.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 46:15 — 21.2MB)

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