In the hustle and bustle of a room in the Chinatown-International District, a group of girls get ready. One does her makeup in a mirror adorned with pictures of former City Councilmember Cheryl Chow. Another sorts through a bin of white sneakers while yet another patiently gets a belt fitted around her waist.
These young women are preparing to march in the 2022 Seattle Chinatown Seafair Parade as the Seattle Chinese Community Girls Drill Team. Donning elaborate red and gold costumes, the marchers move with military-like precision, weaving in and out of formations and calling out moves in the middle of the street, glimmering for the crowds.
Seattle was beautiful when I returned home from Los Angeles.
I had been on a dance tour with one of my besties, my housemate, my art wife, Saira Barbaric. During this summer tour, we built a kind of friend language unlike any I have ever experienced, as well as deepening what we had already been doing: centering our interactions around direct communication, access intimacy, truth-telling, Disability Justice, and being our sweetest, baddest, queerest, Blackest selves all over the West Coast.
Not only have rents skyrocketed to apocalyptic levels, but venues are closing left and right as artists are hightailing it out of the city in search of greener, more affordable pastures. As a city once known for our alternative, cutting-edge art scene, the outlook on fostering that kind of community once again here in Seattle often feels bleak. But in that darkness is hope, which comes in the form of Fantasy A Gets a Mattress, a fever dream of a movie that understands the absurdity of what it means to be an artist in Seattle right now — ridiculous rent, cruel landlords, buses that hardly ever come on time.
Essam Muhammad, a Seattle-based performing artist and songwriter, has been telling the stories of the South End ever since he was a little kid. Art has been his first love since he was 9 years old. “I was exposed to the hip-hop scene from a young age,” Muhammad began.
Recently, Muhammad was able to bring those stories onto the big screen for the first time, acting in a starring role for the feature film, Purple Don’t Cry. Directed by Mamoun Hassan and written by Boonaa Mohammed, the film will be premiering at the Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) on June 1.
Seattle’s 18th Trans Film Fest Is Coming to Columbia City
by Neve Mazique-Bianco
The 2023 TRANSlations: Seattle Trans Film Festival, produced by Three Dollar Bill Cinema, turns 18 this year! To celebrate the fest’s young adulthood, the producers, programmers, jury, and artists have cooked up a wondrous weekend of in-person and online screenings, events, and parties, including two brand-new elements — a new location and a new award! One, TRANSlations is coming to Columbia City! In-person screenings and events will take place at Ark Lodge Cinemas and Beacon Cinema on May 5 and 6, with an after-screening opening night party on May 5 at The Royal Room. Two, earlier that evening, Three Dollar Bill Cinema will present the inaugural TRANSlations Trailblazer Award to filmmaker, actor, and director, Isabel Sandoval.
Welcome to our moon-synced movie review show, hosted by Saira Barbaric and NEVE. This duo of South Seattle creatives make multidisciplinary work together and individually. For this show, they’re ecstatic to join their love of astrology, ritual, and pop culture.
Stream this month’s podcast at the New Moon Movie Review official podcast website.
I might have said this before, but I will never turn down a musical. When I heard that RRR was a traditional Tollywood/Bollywood epic action film with elaborate, intricate musical numbers, I hit play without hesitation. The movie was beyond my expectations. The action, the costumes, and (most critical to this season) the romance were layered and extraordinary. Many movies attempt — and some succeed — at capturing how intimacy and connection can look between two adult men. None that I’ve seen hits the mark with as much reverence, playfulness, and historical fiction as RRR.
The Northwest Film Forum kicked off their 18th Annual Children’s Film Festival Seattle (CFFS) on Feb. 3. The weeklong festival dedicated to celebrating productions made for youth and family will include feature and short films and additional workshop activities with both in-person and online options.
And Other Oppressive Dynamics opens this weekend during the Northwest Film Forum’s 25th Annual Local Sightings Film Festival. The film examines the toxic work culture and discrimination faced by many nonprofit workers in the Seattle area. The premiere will take place in person on Sept. 18 at 4 p.m. at Northwest Film Forum at 1515 12th Ave. An online option will also be available for viewing from Sept. 16 to Sept. 25.
Welcome to our moon-synced movie review show, hosted by Saira Barbaric and NEVE. This duo of South Seattle creatives make multidisciplinary work together and individually. For this show, they’re ecstatic to join their love of astrology, ritual, and pop culture.
Stream this month’s podcast at the New Moon Movie Review official podcast website.
The short and sweet Obvious Child, directed by Gillian Robespierre and starring Jenny Slate, was released in 2014. Still, it gets its name from the 1990’s Paul Simon and Olodum (Black Brazilian drumming and performance collective/political movement, whose name means “God of Gods”) song “The Obvious Child.” “The Obvious Child” was Paul Simon’s reflection on mortality and aging, in which the singer is not only grown but has a child who’s grown. Simon asks, “Why deny the obvious child?” Given that the film Obvious Child is about an unplanned pregnancy in the life of a 20-something comedian, you might think the obvious child is the one that might have been. Still, I like to think that the obvious child is the one in the heart of Slate’s hilarious Donna. Paul Simon and Olodum’s song features in the film as well. Its freckled, speckled, peppered, stacked, happily gnashing drums accompany the scene in which Donna and her one-night stand Max (Jake Lacy) hook up for the first time and inadvertently get pregnant. It’s a very charming scene, with a lot of dancing, jumping, and playing around. Very little obvious sexy time, which I found endearing and wholesome. They were genuinely enjoying themselves, and the movie wanted us to know this. The downside to this scene and song choice is that Max owns both khakis and bongos. You do the math.
Piero Heliczer, Beat poet, experimental filmmaker, and publisher, was a central figure in the 1960s and ʼ70s underground art scene. He published dozens of poems, produced at least 24 films, and participated in Andy Warhol’s Film-Makers’ Cooperative. But in the early 1990s, while reading his poetry at a venue on the famous St. Marks Place, Piero was something much smaller and ordinary: a drunk, disheveled, absentee father under the critical gaze of his 19-year-old daughter, Thérèse Heliczer.
