Yony Leyser USA, DEU 2017 83min
Yony Leyser’s delightfully ragged documentary, QUEERCORE: HOW TO PUNK A REVOLUTION, both documents a historical cultural movement in the LGBTQ+ community, and serves as motivation to create more inclusive, diverse spaces today.
The film hones in on the homocore (more modernly referred to as queercore) movement of the 1980’s and 1990’s, a response to the increasingly violent, masculine tendencies of the punk scene.
The story of the rise of homocore is a story of contradictions and good-natured lies – they spoke a movement into existence by pretending it already existed, encouraging lonely queer punks to seek out, and thereby create communities where they could express their sexuality in ways that grated against more mainstream modes of queer expression. Aside from being supremely informative about the rise of the homocore movement – which continues today in various forms – Leyser’s film raises an interesting question about assimilation: should it be the ultimate goal for queer people? (Clayton Walter)
