Paris Is Burning is a 1990 American documentary film directed by Jennie Livingston. The film chronicles the ball culture of New York City and the African-American, Latino, gay, and transgender communities involved in it. It was filmed in the mid-to-late 1980s and offers an intimate portrait of rival fashion "houses," from fierce contests for trophies to house mothers offering sustenance in a world rampant with homophobia, transphobia, racism, AIDS, and poverty.
The film features legendary voguers, drag queens, and trans women, including Willi Ninja, Pepper LaBeija, Dorian Corey, and Venus Xtravaganza. It was produced and distributed by Jennie Livingston and had a budget of $500,000. The film grossed $3.8 million at the box office.
Paris Is Burning has been widely acclaimed for its exploration of issues of race, class, and gender. Terrence Rafferty of The New Yorker called it "a beautiful piece of work—lively, intelligent, exploratory… Everything about Paris Is Burning signifies so blatantly and so promiscuously that our formulations – our neatly paired theses and antitheses – multiply faster than we can keep track of them. What's wonderful about the picture is that Livingston is smart enough not to reduce her subjects to the sum of their possible meanings...".
In the years following the film's release, it has remained a commonly cited and frequently used organizing tool for LGBT youth, a way for scholars and students to examine issues of race, class, and gender, and a way for younger ball participants to meet their cultural ancestors.
Paris Is Burning is available to watch on Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV. The Criterion Collection has also released a director-approved Blu-ray special edition of the film, which includes a new 2K digital restoration supervised by director Jennie Livingston, a new conversation between Livingston, ball community members Sol Pendavis and Freddie Pendavis, and filmmaker Thomas Allen Harris, and over an hour of additional footage.
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Cast
- Dorian Corey
- Pepper LaBeija
- Venus Xtravaganza
- Octavia St. Laurent
- Willi Ninja
- Carmen Xtravaganza
- Brooke Xtravaganza
- André Christian
- Paris Duprée
- Anji Xtravaganza
- Freddie Pendavis
The film features legendary voguers, drag queens, and trans women, including the performers listed above. The cast members reminisce about their lives and try to explain the subculture of the balls and their importance in the LGBTQ pantheon.
Director: Jennie Livingston
Writer: Jennie Livingston
Box Office Gross: $3,905,297
Distributor: Miramax
Genre: Documentary
Release Date (Theaters): Mar 13, 1990
Rerelease Date (Theaters): Jun 14, 2019
Release Date (Streaming): May 5, 2017