2001-2010 Camp Cheryl Dunye Drama Queer Cinema(s)USA

Cheryl Dunye – The Owls (2010)

adminJanuary 25, 2023

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Enjoyably strange, The Owls is an ambitious mixture of lesbian noir, radically experimental filmmaking and community project; a piece of collective art about age, politics, race, desire and gender anxiety. At a house party hosted by a group of Older Wiser Lesbians a young queer is murdered and their disappearance covered up, but just as the group of women let down their guard, a mysterious stranger comes asking questions.

The filmmakers use an interesting cocktail of unusual cinematographical features for various reasons; a distinct documentary tone, direct mode of address with the audience, non-linear narrative, and vox-pop interviews with both the characters AND the actors who play them throughout the film.

The main characters are dysfunctional, fairly bitter 40-somethings, with no solid, steady relationships portrayed. For me, the extremely believable acting of these characters may cause something of a dilemma to any younger lesbians, to whom this presentation of older lesbians may be seen as particularly negative.