Riot Acts: Flaunting Gender Deviance in Music Performance

2010, 72 minutes
The upper half features a gray-hued image of Geo Wyeth seen from the nose down playing the accordion, overlaid with pink accolades for the film. The lower half features a grainy, indistinct image in olive green. The title is split across the halves, written in a graffiti-style font.
Genre
documentary   music/musical   feature (45 min or over)  
Keywords/themes
queer  
Media type
film/video  
Country of origin

United States of America

Filming locations

Oakland, California, United States of America

San Francisco, California, United States of America

Chicago, Illinois, United States of America

Baltimore, Maryland, United States of America

Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America

Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States of America

St. Louis, Missouri, United States of America

New York City, New York, United States of America

Dowelltown, Tennessee, United States of America

Seattle, Washington, United States of America

Brooklyn, New York City, New York, United States of America

Production company

Theo Films

Technical specs

Colour

16mm

super-8

video

Languages

English/English

Tagalog/Wikang Tagalog

Content Warnings
Unreviewed
Images
The upper half features a gray-hued image of Geo Wyeth seen from the nose down playing the accordion, overlaid with pink accolades for the film. The lower half features a grainy, indistinct image in olive green. The title is split across the halves, written in a graffiti-style font.
Geo Wyeth plays an accordion in a black void, his head seen in profile as he closes his eyes and loses himself in the performance. He has a mop of curly brown hair, light skin, and wears a white shirt with torn sleeves revealing his arm muscles.
Description

Transgender and gender variant musicians share their stories of gender performance onstage and off in Madsen Minax's new rockumentary. This film is not "Gender 101." While Riot Acts acutely addresses the undeniably political nature of gender identities and bodies, it steers clear of portraying trans experiences as tragedy or anomaly. Instead, inspiration and joy take the spotlight as rock, folk, hiphop and other artists make the music that represents their unique identities and creative passions.

Featured interviewees include: Ryka Aoki from Los Angeles; Anderson Toone, Lipstick Conspiracy, Katastrophe, Basic Fix and Trannysaurus Sex from San Francisco; Ryder Richardson, Seattle; Tough Tough Skin and Venus Demars of Minneapolis; Adhamh Roland of St. Louis; Jessica Xavier in DC; The Shondes and Novice Theory in Brooklyn, NY; The Cliks of Toronto and more.

“22nd Vancouver Queer Film Festival,” 2010.
Cast & Crew
Crew
Cast
Distribution
Trailer
Watch trailer (external)
Screenings