Gay usa 1977

Gay USA is a film by Arthur J. Bressan Jr. that captures gay pride events in the U.S. in , a year of backlash against anti-discrimination protection. The film shows the optimism and activism of the gay community at a critical time in its history. Gay USA conveys the passion, anger, and defiant optimism of a community under attack (in that month of June alone: California's anti-gay Briggs Initiative had just been announced, Anita Bryant's vicious homophobia had helped repeal Miami's gay rights ordinance, and a gay man named Robert Hillsborough had only days earlier been the victim.

Filmmaker Arthur Bressan commissions filmmakers throughout the country to record lesbian and gay pride parades and marches in June The landmark documentary "Gay USA" by the gay director Arthur Bressan, Jr., captures the Gay Freedom Day march in San Francisco, but also parades in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago.

Documentarian Arthur Bressan commissioned filmmakers throughout the country to record every Lesbian and Gay Pride parade or march which took place in June of Mixed in with the footage are on-the-street interviews with gay men and women discussing topics such as coming out, men and women. Director Arthur J. Bressan Jr. Gay USA conveys the passion, anger, and defiant optimism of a community under attack in that month of June alone: California's anti-gay Briggs Initiative had just been announced, Anita Bryant's vicious homophobia had helped repeal Miami's gay rights ordinance, and a gay man named Robert Hillsborough had only days earlier been the victim of a fatal gay-bashing in San Francisco.

gay usa trailer

Bressan weaves in audio of some of those homophobic voices and gives an overview of historical homophobia, including an account of gays and the Holocaust — and then illustrates the triumphant power of love and pride. In addition to the magnificent cross-section of footage from the marches in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Diego, and Philadelphia, Gay USA also gives us a fantastic look at rare footage shot by Lilli Vincenz of the very first gay pride parade in New York City in which was then known as Christopher Street Liberation Day as well as showing Bressan's own previously shot footage from San Francisco's first major gay pride celebration in As an estimated , celebrants enjoy the festivities in San Francisco more than double the attendance of the previous year , Bressan's camera crews interview dozens of attendees who share their stories - the lesbian couple who fled the homophobia of Wichita; the self-proclaimed androgynous hermaphrodite who describes feeling "like a whole person instead of just half a person;" the older straight woman ally who explains that, "Whenever anyone group in our society is attacked, we all must come to their aid;" and the irresistible guy standing in the middle of Market Street who proclaims: "Today I'm more than gay, I'm jubilant.

Just a few months later, Harvey Milk was sworn in as a San Francisco Supervisor, becoming one of the first openly gay people elected to public office and delivering a triumphant conclusion to that harrowing year. My naive dream was that if we all saw ourselves in our numbers we would never buy into the guilt trip again. Not even from AIDS Stay Updated. First Name. Last Name. Directed by Arthur J.