Bear Shorts Vol. 1

By: Amos Lassen

"Bear Shorts
Shorts from the Vermont Bear Film Festival
Amos Lassen

"Bear Shorts" is wonderful. This collection of 10 short films contains parodies, an interview with "beatnik" poet Allen Ginsberg and footage of the Radical Faeries.
The interview with Ginsberg is a treasure. We get an inside look at Ginsberg as he tell that he is a deeply sexual man lusting after Jack Kerouac. He also reads one of his poems, "In Society" and this is a bold look at Ginsberg was a rebel and f you have never heard him read, you have missed something. No one can read his own work better than then author himself and if for no other reason, this is why you should see the collection.
But there are other reasons why this collection is so good. Many of us have heard of the Radical Faeries and perhaps seen photographs of them but few have had the opportunity to see the faeries on film. Here we can not only see them but we also get to see one of the most instrumental people o gay rights-Harry Hay. In "Goat Boy", a film made by Hay, we have a faerie ritual (complete with frontal nudity). Goat Boy, the character, loves potato chips and when he goes to find some, we get an inside look at the early days of the Radical Faeries in a periodic short film.
"Casey's Dad" is a take-off of "Stacy's Mom" by alternative rock band "Fountains of Wayne" which is very clever. "How Do I Look Mr. Metro Bear" by Wolfgang Bush is a fashion show like none you have ever seen. Boots, bears and chubs are part of "The Hairy Underbelly of Portugal" is my personal favorite and is a revelation. Set to an aria by Verdi and sung by Maria Callas it bearishly looks at the hairy side of part of the Iberian Peninsula.
Clark Nikolai provides three short films, "An der Nordseekuste" (a favorite of the Bear festival goers), "My Heart the Cook" (very funny as it looks at the relationship between bears and food) and "Yankee Lust", a look at the Folsom Street Fair where anything goes and "Men on Fur on Men" a sensual satire on fat, hairy, sagging older men.
The "Oscar" of the Vermont Film Festival is known as the PAW award and it was awarded to "Avec des Excuses a Alfred" by Dan Dowling and Rob Sherman. It watches a hairy man take a shower and satirizes that great shower scene in Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho".
Hopefully this collection is just the first of many. It preserves part of our history and gives a look at both ourselves and others. This is definitely a must-see.