Ten women in Canada talk about being lesbian in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s: discovering the pulp fiction of the day about women in love, their own first affairs, the pain of breaking up, frequenting gay bars, facing police raids, men's responses, and the etiquette of butch and femme roles. Interspersed among the interviews and archival footage are four dramatized chapters from a pulp novel, "Forbidden Love".
Direction
Interviews and pulp reenactments weave intimate, playful structure.
Writing
Narration by Ann-Marie MacDonald drips with knowing wit.
Production
Archival bar footage and photos feel like stolen time.
Director
Lynne Fernie
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
The dramatized pulp chapters are adapted from actual 1950s lesbian pulp fiction, a genre sold in drugstores but coded enough to avoid censorship — the film treats these trashy novels as genuine artifacts of desire.
Director Lynne Fernie came out during production; the film's existence as government-funded queer documentary in 1992 was itself a political act — it screened at TIFF when Canadian film was still largely silent on LGBTQ histories.
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