Snow White, Rewritten in a Minor Key
Despite the film’s efforts to reframe its heroine with modern complexity, a certain emotional distance lingers.

Before YouTube, Lavender Lounge lit up public access TV with a ’90s queer and trans dance party and groundbreaking show, capturing San Francisco’s first Dyke March and the first official Pride video. Thirty years later, creator Mark Kliem brings rare footage to light, reuniting the original crew with younger generations when queer history is again under attack.
Despite the film’s efforts to reframe its heroine with modern complexity, a certain emotional distance lingers.
Two Distant Strangers (2020) centers around Carter James (Joey Bada$$) as he tries to get back home to his pitbull, Jeter, after spending a night at the apartment of his date Perri (Zaria Simone). What gets in the way of Carter reuniting with his dog is that every time he tries to leave Perri’s apartment, he is killed by police and wakes up back in her bed in a never-ending cycle. It addresses the issue of police brutality which rightly has been in the public eye more and more with the unjust deaths caused at the hands of law enforcement.
While it is more than established that Halston’s life is far from a fairytale, the narrative suffers as a result of the decision to revolve more around sex and drugs than his artistry, it likely does a disservice to his cultural impact by pulling focus from his achievements.
What can I say about this Will Ferrell/Julia Louis-Dreyfus-led “dramedy?” Well, the comedy part of Downhill is completely non-existent. And I should have known that the film was a flop when I walked into an empty theater at a prime time on a Friday night.
Treated like a granter of wishes for those earning out of retelling the same tragedy, Marilyn looks like she's caged in different stages of trauma for us to stare at, instead of someone we’ve finally allowed to rest in peace.
Animation as a medium of storytelling can be thought to be open to all ages and as I hope my readings will reveal, they could be interpreted as transgender stories.