Tongues Untied (1989) on Netflix
NR198955mDocumentary
A Black gay man makes a video essay to break the silence around Black gay identity. It moves between poetry, memories of growing up, men dancing together and comic lessons in snapping.
- Netflix2.9/5
- IMDb7.1/102,189 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes100%
Trailer
Plot summary
Documentary footage, personal recollection and poetry are woven together to make Black gay identity visible and to name the silence that surrounds it. The maker describes growing up and his realization of his sexual identity, and a poet performs verses of his own. Scenes follow gay Black men through social gatherings and dance, and through comic riffs set in an Institute of Snap!thology, where the sling snap, the point snap and the diva snap are taught. It also describes the exclusions Black gay men meet: a white-centered gay community, church leaders who call gay relationships an abomination, and Black political activists who see being Black and gay as a conflict of loyalties. Footage of the civil rights movement and of a comedian's stand-up routine about gay men runs alongside.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Tongues Untied (1989)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Marlon Riggs made the film with his own money plus a $5,000 grant traceable to the National Endowment for the Arts, and that small sum set off a national argument over federal arts funding once PBS scheduled it on POV, which itself had $250,000 of NEA money.
- Reverend Donald E. Wildmon of the American Family Association attacked PBS for showing the film, yet said he wanted as many people as possible to watch it, believing Americans would be appalled to see what their taxes had paid for.
- During the 1992 Republican primaries Pat Buchanan cut clips from the film into an attack advertisement against President George H. W. Bush over "pornographic and blasphemous art". Riggs proved the ad breached his copyright and it was pulled off the air.
- Presenting a Peabody tribute to Riggs in May 2019, Billy Porter of Pose said he had watched Tongues Untied when PBS broadcast it, that it changed his life and that it gave him his voice as a young man.
Stills
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