It is highly tempting when critiquing media so focus ones attention exclusively on mainstream large budget artifacts. Certainly there is important work to be done in exploring and critiquing these texts, they reach large audiences, and play a critical role in cultural constructions and understandings. With that in mind, I think it is also important to remember that independent media is still media and within our own little subcultures plays a large and important role in how we as queer folk conceptualize ourselves and those around us. “FTF: Female to Femme” is an independent film which debuted in 2006. In theory it is a film, which challenges the constructions of what it means to be a femme, positing femme can and should be understood, as it’s own gender separate from that of woman. FTF professes to align femme experience with that of other transgender peoples and suggesting (as many femmes have) that femme far from buying into cultural norms of femininity is instead subverting normative constructions of femininity and in effect queering them. Like many other genderqueer femmes I eagerly awaited my opportunity to view this groundbreaking film. Unfortunately the film fell far short of my expectations.
As apposed to positioning femme as a unique gender onto itself, FTF continually equated femme with woman, and furthermore with lesbian. Instead of challenging categories of identification and attempting to break out of a binary gender system FTF reinforces categorization, which places femme identity as being exclusively tied to “woman” and “lesbian.” Routinely within the documentary the femmes featured spoke of a collective “lesbian” experience and what that meant. This was particularly evident in the interviews with writer Jewelle Gomez whose reputed comments about femme being a radical feminist woman’s experience hurt the overall quality of the film. While of course it is important to discuss the ways in which feminist lesbian history has impacted the construction of a modern femme identity, and that for many of us that is a tangible history we can return to. It seems, counterintuitive to focus exclusively on this incarnation of femme if in fact the true purpose of the film is to challenge the borders of femme as an identity and shift it’s meaning into something outside that of “woman.”
In fact the only seemed to be a couple of the femmes featured in the film that were able to separate the concept of femme as an identity away from that of woman or lesbian and conceptualize them as separate entities. However the important messages presented by thus femmes particularly those of professor Masha Raskolnikov was lost in the overarching constructions of femme being exclusively and intimately tied to the categories of “woman” and “lesbian.” At times I found myself wondering if I was watching a documentary of burlesque troupes and not one about queer femme identity and it’s place in radical gender identity. While I appreciate burlesque as much as the next femme, and am in complete agreement that for many femmes it is an important part of their femme expression and identity, it wasn’t situated well within the film. While watching the film, it felt simply like filler and didn’t do much to further the intended purpose of the documentary. Additionally the mock femme transition support group which was intended to be comical didn't read as comedy (I only was able to learn that was it's intention from promotional materials). FTF was such an impressively cleaver title and places femme as a gender transgression similar to that of FTM or MTF experiences, thus furthering the work being done to make a place for femmes in the trans community as something more than allies.
Yet despite all of my critiques I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the screen the first time I viewed the film. I felt a kinship with the film even though I was thoroughly disappointed. There are so few representations of femme in the media, and specifically representations of femmes where we aren’t being mocked or ridiculed as “lipstick lesbians,” where it isn’t being argued that we are less queer, and where we have a voice to speak for ourselves I desperately wanted to fall in love with this documentary. And in a way I did, but what does it mean that because of a lack of representation we must settle for something that falls drastically short of even it’s own self professed goals?
Trailer for the film can be viewed here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mK9m7ls7crk
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