UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty and staff have free access to streaming movies, documentaries, e-books and artists’ books from all over the globe. We’ve put together a short selection of these items to celebrate LGBTQ Pride Month. See the list below:
Movies
Adam
“Awkward, self-conscious Adam Freeman has just finished his junior year of high school in 2006. When his cool older sister Casey suggests he visit her in New York for the summer, Adam has visions of meeting a girl and finally gaining some actual life experience. The fantasy doesn’t materialize exactly as expected. Casey has enthusiastically embraced life amidst Brooklyn’s young LGBTQ community and invites Adam to tag along with her to queer bars, marriage equality rallies and other happenings. When Adam falls at first sight for Gillian, a smart, beautiful young woman in this new crowd, she mistakenly assumes he is trans. Flummoxed and enamored, he haplessly goes along with her assumption, resulting in an increasingly complex comedy-and tragedy-of errors he’s ill-equipped to navigate” – Container.
Check out “Adam” on DVD at the Media & Design Center.
As Cores do Divino (The Divine Colors of the Rainbow) (2020)
A series of conversations about how LGBT people from Brazil connect with religion, faith and spirituality.
Brokeback Mountain (2005)
It’s 1963 and Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist find themselves thrown together when they are hired to tend sheep in the remote area of Brokeback Mountain, Wyoming. Ennis and Jack are inexorably drawn to each other through their proximity, loneliness and a shared lack of tenderness and emotion in their lives.
Croce e Delizia (An Almost Ordinary Summer) (2020)
Two very different families spend their holidays in the same house at the seaside: the aristocratic Castelvecchios, open-minded, eccentric, but quite selfish, and the working-class Petagnas, very tight-knit, and united around solid conservative values. What brought such distant worlds together? Only Tony and Carlo, the two middle-aged heads of the families, know. The unexpected announcement of their engagement will disrupt an apparently ordinary summer and turn everyone’s lives upside down.
Check out “Croce e Delizia” on DVD at the Media & Design Center.
El cazador (2020)
A 15-year-old young man burning with desire to have sex with another man gets involved with a manipulative and exploitative porn plot.
Check out El Cazador on DVD at the Media & Design Center.
Fin de Siglo (End of the Century) (2020)
Lucio Castro offers both a sun-soaked European travelogue and an epic, decades-spanning romance. When Ocho, a 30-something Argentine poet on vacation in Barcelona, spots Javi, a Spaniard from Berlin, the attraction is subtle but persistent. After a missed connection on the beach, a third chance encounter escalates to a seemingly random hookup. But are these two merely beautiful strangers in a foreign city, or are they part of each other’s histories, and maybe even their destinies.
Check out “Fin de Siglo” on DVD at the Media & Design Center.
Forbidden Love: The Unashamed Stories of Lesbian Lives (2015)
A group of nine compelling, hilarious and always rebellious women paint a portrait of lesbian sexuality against a backdrop of tabloid headlines, book covers and dramatizations from lesbian pulp novels.
Fractal: Stories Across the Gender Spectrum (2022)
“Fractal: Stories Across the Gender Spectrum” is a collection of 4 Transgender and Gender Queer Documentary Shorts that explores the wide spectrum of experiences often left out of the traditional narrative. From a successful trans woman running her own salon in New Orleans to a collective experimental video essay road film; the collection expands on the joys, struggles and honest conversations within the community.
Stream “Fractal: Stories Across the Gender Spectrum.”
From This Day Forward (2017)
When director Sharon Shattuck’s father came out as transgender and changed her name to Trisha, Sharon was in the awkward throes of middle school. Her father’s transition to female was difficult for her straight-identified mother, Marcia, to accept, but her parents stayed together. As the Shattucks reunite to plan Sharon’s wedding, she seeks a deeper understanding of how her parents’ marriage survived the radical changes that threatened to tear them apart.
Stream “From This Day Forward.”
How to Survive a Plague (2012)
“How to Survive a Plague” tells the story of the young men and women who reversed the tide of an epidemic, demanded the attention of a fearful nation and stopped AIDS from becoming a death sentence. This group of activists bucked oppression and infiltrated government agencies and the pharmaceutical industry, helping to identify promising new medication and treatments and move them through trials and into drugstores.
Stream “How to Survive a Plague.”
Inside the Chinese Closet (2015)
Andy and Cherry are looking for love and happiness in Shanghai. They are homosexual but their families demand a (heterosexual) marriage and children. Being single and childless would mean an unacceptable loss of face for their rural families in the remote countryside where they live. Andy and Cherry’s stories mirror the legal and cultural progress in China against the backdrop of a nation coming to terms with new moral values.
Stream “Inside the Chinese Closet.”
Inside Out (2006)
“Inside Out” documents the daily activities of three individuals who are coming to terms with their transgender identities and the related emotional and physical transformations while living in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Los Fuertes (The Strong Ones) (2021)
Lucas travels to visit his sister, who lives in a remote town in Southern Chile. Beside the ocean shrouded in the wintry mist, he meets Antonio, a boatswain on a local fishing boat. When an intense romance blossoms between them, their strength, their independence, and their adulthood become immovable, just like the ebb and flow of the tide.
Check out The Strong Ones on DVD at the Media & Design Center.
Madam Phung’s Last Journey (2016)
“Madam Phung’s Last Journey” takes viewers on a year-long ride with an itinerant troupe of cross-dressing performers, led by Madam Phung, as they travel the remote southern regions and central highlands of Vietnam.
Stream “Madam Phung’s Last Journey.”
Mama’s Boy (2022)
HBO documentary Mama’s Boy, centers around the upbringing of the Academy Award®-winning screenwriter of Milk, Dustin Lance Black. Traveling back to the places where he grew up, Black explores his childhood roots, gay identity and close relationship with his mother, who overcame childhood polio, abusive marriages and Mormon dogma, while becoming Black’s emotional rock and, ultimately, the inspiration for his activism. Adapted from Black’s 2019 memoir “Mama’s Boy: A Story from our Americas,” the documentary is a provocative and powerful journey through America as well as a moving tribute to a mother’s courage and a reckoning with the strength she instilled in her son to fight for his beliefs.
Moonlight (2016)
A young black man grapples with his identity and sexuality while experiencing the struggles of childhood, adolescence and burgeoning adulthood.
Stream “Moonlight” on Swank Digital Campus.
Muội (2022)
Despite a tumultuous childhood, a complicated present as a queer single mom navigating the limitations of a restrictive and traditional Vietnamese culture, and the daunting prospects of a bleak future, Muội Hồng persists in dreaming of life as an artist. She finds healing, strength, expression, community, meaning, and authenticity in her pursuit of hip hop dancing. Muội follows her progress towards her goal of becoming a dancer in the luxurious Vinpearl in Nha Trang, immersing audiences in the underground dance and queer culture of contemporary Vietnam.
My Beautiful Laundrette (1985)
Set in the Pakistani community in south London, “My Beautiful Laundrette” focuses on two youths: Johnny, who is white and working-class, and Omar, who is Pakistani. Together, they operate a laundromat, which Omar inherits from his uncle. While Johnny looks upon the laundromat as a lifeline on which to salvage his self-respect, Omar sees it as just the beginning step on the road to riches.
Stream “My Beautiful Laundrette.”
Portrait of a Lady On Fire (2021)
Marianne is hired to paint the wedding portrait of Héloïse. As the women orbit each other, intimacy and attraction grow as they share Héloïse’s first moments of freedom. Nominated for Best Motion Picture – Foreign Language at the Golden Globes. Winner of Best Screenplay at the Cannes Film Festival.
Stream “Portrait of a Lady On Fire.”
Queen of Lapa (2021)
A proud transgender sex worker since the age of eleven, Luana Muniz, now fifty-nine, shapes a new reality in her “hostel” by housing a new generation of transgender sex workers in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. “Queen of Lapa” explores the day-to-day lives, rivalries and quests for love of sex workers, as Muniz’s guides them in a city full of hostility towards its LGBTQIA+ community.
Rebels on Pointe (2017)
Exploring themes of identity, dreams and family, “Rebels on Pointe” is a documentary film celebrating the world-famous Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo. The all-male drag ballet company was founded over 40 years ago in New York City on the heels of the Stonewall riots. The film juxtaposes intimate behind-the-scenes access, rich archives and history, engaging character driven stories and dance performances shot in North America, Europe and Japan.
Un Rubio (The Blonde One) (2019)
In the suburbs of Buenos Aires, Gabriel has just moved in with his colleague, Juan. Shy and reserved, Gabriel is reluctant to follow Juan’s wandering hands and meaningful looks. With a revolving door of beauties streaming out of Juan’s bedroom, his machismo seems firmly in place. However, the attraction between the two men is undeniable.
Check out “Un Rubio” at the Media & Design Center.
Wojnarowicz (2021)
Wojnarowicz is a fiery and urgent documentary portrait of downtown New York City artist, writer, photographer, and activist David Wojnarowicz. As New York City became the epicenter of the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s, Wojnarowicz weaponized his work and waged war against the establishment’s indifference to the plague until his death from it in 1992 at the age of 37. Exclusive access to his breathtaking body of work – including paintings, journals, and films – reveals how Wojnarowicz emptied his life into his art and activism. Rediscovered answering machine tape recordings and intimate recollections from Fran Lebowitz, Gracie Mansion, Peter Hujar, and other friends and family help present a stirring portrait of this fiercely political, unapologetically queer artist.
Who’s on top? (2021)
“Who’s on Top?” (narrated by George Takei) is the emotional story of members of the LGBTQ community who challenge stereotypes about gender and sexuality and demonstrate their diverse journeys in overcoming physical and figurative mountains.
Books
Against the Closet: Black Political Longing and the Erotics of Race by Aliyyah I. Abdur Rahman
In Against the Closet , Aliyyah I. Abdur-Rahman interrogates and challenges cultural theorists’ interpretations of sexual transgression in African American literature. She argues that, from the mid-nineteenth century through the twentieth, black writers used depictions of erotic transgression to contest popular theories of identity, pathology, national belonging, and racial difference in American culture. Connecting metaphors of sexual transgression to specific historical periods, Abdur-Rahman explains how tropes such as sadomasochism and incest illuminated the psychodynamics of particular racial injuries and suggested forms of social repair and political redress from the time of slavery, through post-Reconstruction and the civil rights and black power movements, to the late twentieth century.
Are Prisons Obsolete? By Angela Davis
For generations of Americans, the abolition of slavery was sheerest illusion. Similarly, the entrenched system of racial segregation seemed to last forever. The brutal and exploitative American prison system that has succeeded formal slavery has reaped millions of dollars to states, as well as untold miseries for tens of thousands of people. In this book, Angela Davis argues how social movements transformed these institutions and made such practices untenable. (Adapted from catalog summary.)
Black. Queer. Southern. Women. By E. Patrick Johnson
Drawn from the life narratives of more than seventy African American queer women who were born, raised, and continue to reside in the American South, this book powerfully reveals the way these women experience and express racial, sexual, gender, and class identities–all linked by a place where such identities have generally placed them on the margins of society. Using methods of oral history and performance ethnography, E. Patrick Johnson’s work vividly enriches the historical record of racialized sexual minorities in the South and brings to light the realities of the region’s thriving black lesbian communities.
Ceremonies: Prose and Poetry by Essex Hemphill
Essex Hemphill is a gay American poet and activist whose work centered around the intersection of race, identity, sexuality and HIV. In 1992, “Ceremonies” won the National Library Association’s Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual New Author Award.
Directed By Desire: The Collected Poems Of June Jordan by June Jordan
June Jordan is a Jamaican American writer, poet, playwright and essayist. Her works, many autobiographical in nature, cover topics such as civil rights and sexual expression. “Directed by Desire” is a collection of her work spanning from her early career to her battle with and eventual death from breast cancer.
Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
Set in contemporary Paris, a young American man finds himself caught between desire and conventional morality. James Baldwin’s novel delves into the mystery of love with a powerful story about the complexities of sexuality.
Honeypot : Black southern women who love women by E. Patrick Johnson
“Honeypot” opens with the fictional trickster character Miss B. barging into the home of Dr. EPJ, informing him that he has been chosen to collect and share the stories of her people. With little explanation, she whisks the reluctant Dr. EPJ away to the women-only world of Hymen, where she serves as his tour guide as he bears witness to the real-life stories of queer Black women throughout the American South. The women he meets come from all walks of life and recount their experiences on topics ranging from coming out and falling in love to mother/daughter relationships, religion, and political activism.. Combining oral history with magical realism and poetry, “Honeypot” is an engaging and moving book that reveals the complexity of identity while offering a creative method for scholarship to represent the lives of other people in a rich and dynamic way.
Just as I Am by E. Lynn Harris
E. Lynn Harris’s novel centers around the lives of Raymond, a young black lawyer from the South, and Nicole, an aspiring artist. Their ideas and experiences with love, sexuality and authenticity help to show the complexities of queer life.
Miracle’s Boys by Jacqueline Woodson
This young adult novel by Jacqueline Woodson follows three brothers growing up in Washington Heights, New York. The brothers, orphaned by the death of their mother, struggle with the emotions that accompany the loss of parents and the work of getting through their day-to-day life.
Spirited: Affirming the Soul and Black Gay/Lesbian Identity by G. Winston James and Lisa C. Moore
Literary Nonfiction. African American Studies. LGBT Studies. Finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in Spirituality. “Spirited: Affirming the Soul and Black Gay/Lesbian Identity” is a collection of essays that centers on the relationships between spirituality, religion and self-acceptance.
Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters
“Tipping the Velvet” is a historical novel set in 19th-century England. The book is a coming-of-age story of a woman who falls in love with someone unexpected and their experiences in London.
Untamed by Glennon Doyle
“Untamed” is the third memoir written by blogger Glennon Doyle. This book depicts her experiences of realization and self-acceptance while exiting her marriage with her husband and falling in love with a woman.
Zami, a New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde
Audre Lorde is an American poet, writer and activist who dedicated her life and work to fight racism, classism, sexism and homophobia. “Zami” depicts Lorde’s childhood of growing up in Harlem to immigrant parents, to her development and adulthood. Much of the book is dedicated to the women in her life that helped to shape her identity.
Artists’ Books
Art After Stonewall: 1969-1989
Edited by Jonathan Weinberg with Tyler Cann, Anastasia Kinigopoulo, and Drew Sawyer
“Art After Stonewall” reveals the impact of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender civil rights movement on the art world. The Stonewall Riots of June 1969 sparked the beginning of the struggle for gay and lesbian equality, and yet fifty years later, key artists who fomented the movement remain little known. This book tells the stories behind their works, which cut across media, performance, photographs, painting, sculpture, film and music with images taken from magazines, newspapers and television.
Request “Art After Stonewall” online to check out.
Boys Don’t Cry
Artist: Frank Ocean
This 360-page glossy magazine is the companion piece to Ocean’s most recent full-length album, “Blonde.” The publication includes photography and short stories. “Boys Don’t Cry” mixes Ocean’s personal narratives with visuals of cars, the human form, textiles, portraiture and landscapes.
“Boys Don’t Cry” is available in-library use only from the Sloane Art Library Artists’ Books Collection.
El muro/The Wall
Artist: Eduardo Hernández Santos
“El muro” is a collection of ten triptych photographs documenting the Cuban LGBTQ community. Eduardo Hernández Santos made these photographs of homosexuals, transgenders and crossdressers in the summer of 2005 at Havana, Cuba’s seafront wall. Hernández Santos used transfer lettering to press onto his images the words of the late, gay, Cuban poet and playwright, Virgilio Pinera. Taken together, the pictures in this book tell a story of human endurance and triumph.
“El muro/The Wall” is available in-library use only from the Sloane Art Library Artists’ Books Collection.
Faces and Phases
Artist: Zanele Muholi
South African photographer Zanele Muholi’s images offer a bold stance against the stigmatization of lesbian and gay sexualities in Africa and beyond. The “Faces and Phases” series of black and white portraits by Muholi focuses on the commemoration and celebration of black lesbians’ lives.
Request “Faces and Phases” online to check out.
The Fae Richards Photo Archive
Artists: Cheryl Dunye and Zoe Leonard
“The Fae Richards Photo Archive” is a collaborative project of filmmaker Cheryl Dunye and photographer Zeo Leonmard. The photo narrative comprises of eighty-two images that document the life story of Fae Richards, a fictional black lesbian actress and blues singer. Dunye later made the film “The Watermelon Woman” about Richards and the archive itself.
Request “The Fae Richards Photo Archive” online to check out.
How To Transition On 63 Cents A Day
Artist: Lee Krist
This unbound book is a memoir with a non-linear narrative that unfolds through thirty postcards from the author to his mother. This epistolary tells the tale of the author moving from New York City to Portland, Oregon, and physically transitioning from female to male.
“How To Transition On 63 Cents A Day” is available in-library use only from the Sloane Art Library Artists’ Books Collection.
Ladies First
Artist: Keith Smith
“Ladies First” continues Smith’s playful exploration of art history and gender as the female subjects of formal 18th and 19th century portraits take younger, wax-chested male lovers or transition into men with accompanying commentary for the portraits. The bottom border contains a running text regarding the process of “Ladies First.”
“Ladies First” is available in-library use only from the Sloane Art Library Artists’ Books Collection.
Parallax
Artist: Karen Chance
“Parallax” depicts the thoughts and reveries of two men who encounter each other on the subway, one straight, one gay, and their opposing views on male homosexuality.
“Parallax” is available in-library use only from the Sloane Art Library Artists’ Books Collection.
Pinups
Artist: Christopher Schulz
“Pinups” is a queer zine that features either one or two nude models in each issue. The magazine exists in book form but can be disassembled and tiled to reveal a life-size image.
“Pinups” is available in-library use only from the Sloane Art Library Artists’ Books Collection.
Wrongly Bodied: Documenting Transition from Female to Male
Artist: Clarissa Sligh
“Wrongly Bodied” relates the stories of Jake, a contemporary white male imprisoned in a woman’s body, as he transitions from female to male, and Ellen Craft, a 19th century black slave woman who escapes to Philadelphia from Georgia by passing as a white male slave owner.
“Wrongly Bodied” is available in-library use only from the Sloane Art Library Artists’ Books Collection.
Find more films to stream on our library streaming guide. Learn more about the Artists’ Books Collection and find books from the Art Library’s collection in the library catalog. During June, you can find e-books and audiobooks in the Libraries’ LGBTQIA+ Reads collection and Transgender Awareness list on OverDrive.
Descriptions are from the Libraries’ catalog or provided by Library staff. This post was last updated on June 2, 2023.
