Ira Sachs: Gay Marxist Cinéaste

Sachs, who says he has a “Marxist perspective on how people live”, was raised in Memphis, the only openly gay teenager in his high school. He was one of only two out students in his class at Yale. He got his first taste of how economics can affect the makeup of a neighbourhood after moving to Brooklyn in 1988. “I was the white, Yale graduate coming to town to find my place,” he recalls. “I moved to an Italian neighbourhood – the street was Dominican. When I arrived there were three Dominican social clubs on my corner, and within three years they were all gone.” ...

Has his sexuality been a stumbling block? He equivocates. “I think the stories one chooses to tell – that’s what hinders you. I’m a gay man. But you may say first off that I’m a man. The power that sometimes comes with that is part of who I am, as much as the vulnerability that my sexuality might create.”

Change can’t come quickly, he thinks, because minority tastes must remain such in today’s marketplace. “I find that my generation of both gay film-makers and independent film-makers are having a hard time creating sustained careers because of content. Content needs to be homogenised. And what tends to happen is the dominant cultures tend to become the homogenous cultures.”

Guardian.

Possibly the most important gay Marxist filmmaker since Pasolini.

Nah, I haven't watched anything by him either.