Hide and Seek is a daring exploration into wild, uncharted territory—lesbian adolescence in the 1960’s. Lou is a 12-year-old girl who daydreams in a tree house, tries not to watch a sex education film, wins a rock throwing contest, and is horrified to discover that her best friend is taking an interest in earrings and boys. Interwoven with Lou’s story are the mostly hilarious, sometimes painful recollections of adult lesbians who try to figure out how they ever got from there to here. Completing the picture are clips from a wide array of old scientific and educational films which blend seamlessly with the beautiful black and white images of Lou’s world. Hide and Seek is for every woman who’s been to a slumber party and every man who wonders what went on at one.
“Hide and Seek is rueful, funny, multifaceted and sharply intelligent.”
—Stuart Klawans, The Nation
“Hide and Seek is one of the most piquant memory films I know, at once roiling with the tenderness and cruelty of adolescence and marbled by the wisdom of age.”
—Scott Foundas, LA Weekly
“Hide and Seek is A Girl’s Own Story for lesbians. Friedrich has woven a rich and provocative tapestry that assaults complacent assumptions about pubescent desire and lesbian identity, all the while raising important questions about the representation of racial and sexual fantasy life. [The film is] thoroughly engaging from beginning to end.”
—Yvonne Rainer
Hide and Seek (1996)
Produced by Eva Kolodner and Katie Roumel
Written by Su Friedrich and Cathy Nan Quinlan
Cinematography by Jim Denault
Production design by Debbie Devilla
Edited by Su Friedrich
Actors: Chels Holland, Ariel Mara, Lindsay A. Martinelli, Alicia Manta, Nikki Michaels, Kirsten Oriol, Sharon Jane Smith, Noah Wilson, Brandon Winston, Apryl Wynter, Ashley Carlisle, Meleena Waddy
Interview subjects: Mindy Baransky, Cindy Bink, Gina Caulfield, Kelly Cogswell, Marlene Colburn, Dorothy Danaher, Tracey Frederick, Maria Honan, Delritta Hornbuckle, Alisa Lebow, Jane Perkins, Cheryl Perry, Ann Podolske, Pat Powell, Linda Small, Claudia Steinberg, Jean Edna White
Produced with funding from ITVS, the NEA, and the New York State Council on the Arts
63 minutes,16mm, b&w
Awards:
Outstanding Documentary Feature Award: OutFest Gay and Lesbian Film Festival ‘97, LA
Best Narrative Film Award: Athens International Film and Video Festival, OH
Special Jury Award: The New York Gay and Lesbian Film Festival
Juror’s Choice Award: Charlotte Film Festival, NC
Honorable Mention: Image Film and Video Festival
Selected Screenings:
Sundance Film Festival; Berlin International Film Festival; Frameline Film Festival, San Francisco; Women In the Director’s Chair, Chicago; Inside Out Festival, Toronto; Viennale Film Festival, Austria; Umea Film Festival, Sweden; Melbourne Film Festival, Australia; Seoul Queer Film and Video Festival, Korea; MIX Festival, Brazil; Philadelphia Festival of World Cinema, PA; Tokyo International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival, Japan; SXSW Film Festival, Texas; Lesbian Film Festival, Paris; Dublin Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, Ireland; 31st International Women Films Festival, Creteil, FR; Ambulante Film Festival, Mexico; Wellington Film Festival, NZ; Umea Film Festival, Sweden; Lesbian Film Festival, Athens, Greece; MIX Festival, Brazil; Turku Lesbian and Gay Film Festival; “Love’s Body” at Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Japan; Jerusalem Film Festival; Dublin Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, Ireland; Melbourne Film Festival; Seoul Queer Film & Video Festival, Korea; Lesbian Film Festival, Berlin; “Pioneers of Queer Cinema,” at UCLA Film & Television Archive and at Metrograph Cinema, NY; Punto de Vista Film Festival, Pamplona, Spain; La Filmoteca de Galicia, Spain; La Filmoteca Valenciana, Spain; Filmoteca Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain; Cineteca, Madrid, Spain
