Pride Month Preview: Velvet Goldmine, Dont Look Back, and Tongues Untied

Hello Hard Light readers. We’re back after a brief hiatus to offer previews to not one, not two, but three upcoming screenings that we have in the next few weeks! It’s an exciting month for Hard Light’s programming as we have two pride month screenings and another Hard Light staff pick to continue our effort to bring you niche and curated programming.

This newsletter will first preview our three screenings- Todd Haynes’ Velvet Goldmine (1998) on June 12th, the Bob Dylan documentary Dont Look Back (1967) on June 13th, and a full program of queer shorts headlined by Marlon Riggs’ Tongues Untied (1989) and featuring the Richmond debut of selections from the 2025 Queer Cinema for Palestine’s “No Pride in Genocide” short film program. After our previews, we’ll have the return of our beloved “What We’re Into” segment followed by the debut of our Hard Light Staff Picks from our rental library where we’ll feature different movies that Hard Light staff appreciate and Hard Light members can borrow for free!

Velvet Goldmine (1998) dir. Todd Haynes – Jack Wolfe

On June 12th, we are screening Todd Haynes’ cult classic Velvet Goldmine at Tilt Creative + Production. The first in our series of pride month screenings, we are proud to introduce this queer cult classic. Opening the film with a scene of a young Oscar Wilde proclaiming “I want to be a pop idol” Haynes sets the stage for the film’s tagline “The secret to becoming a star is knowing how to behave like one.” While this film focuses on Brian Slade’s (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) ascent to stardom, it equally portrays what it is like to be a fan participating in stardom through a young gay journalist named Arthur Stuart (Christian Bale).

Velvet Goldmine takes its name from a Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust B-side, and originally began with the intention of being focused on David Bowie using his music. When Bowie himself refused to allow the film to use his discography, it began to take a new shape as the film we see today. While the film contains a handful of loose parallels, the only time Bowie is featured is during Lou Reed’s “Satellite of Love”, which he was a producer and provided backing vocals.

In true Todd Haynes fashion, this film has a rock-star-studded soundtrack, featuring songs from Pulp, Brian Eno, Lou Reed, T-Rex, and Placebo. It is also jam packed with covers by fictional bands like Venus in Furs that is made up of some members of Radiohead, Craig Clune, Suede’s Bernard Butler, and Roxy Music’s Andy Mackay, Placebo playing a fictional band named “Flaming Creatures,” along with Wylde Ratttz as the backing band for Curt Wild (Ewan McGregor), and features Thurston Moore and Steve Shelley of Sonic Youth, The Stooges’ Ron Asheton, Mike Watt of Minutemen, Jim Dunbar, and Mike Arm of Mudhoney. Their performance of Iggy Pop and the Stooges’ “TV Eye” is not to be missed.

At its root, this film is all about performance. The performance you put on for an audience of multiple people, a single person, or just yourself. Velvet Goldmine has no shortage of gorgeous costuming, homages to other classic films, and an incredible soundtrack. It’s truly one of a kind. See you at the movies!

Join us at Tilt on June 12th at 7PM (doors at 6PM). More information and tickets here.

Dont Look Back (1967) dir. D.A. Pennebaker – Jay Wilson

Who is Bob Dylan really?

This was the question the media and the listening public found themselves asking every six months or so by 1965. In the three years following his unassuming debut on Columbia Records in 1962, Bob Dylan released five albums of material. With each record, he undid everything you thought you knew about him from the last one. The wide-eyed and often idyllic material on 1963’s Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan gave way to the sober, righteous, and mature tone of the following year’s The Times They Are A-Changin’. He followed it up with the wildly surreal and consciously apolitical lyrics of Another Side of Bob Dylan, released in the same calendar year. Then he went electric with side A of Bringing It All Back Home, largely abandoning the image of the boyish Village folkie in favor of the sneering, delirious rock star.

In the shadow of Back Home’s release, Dylan was on the precipice of finally burying his folkie persona, hopping across the Atlantic for what would turn out to be his final acoustic solo tour. This is where we find ourselves in Dont Look Back: a fly on the wall during arguably the most pivotal period in the career of one of American music’s most lauded and idiosyncratic artists.

It’s also a document of a twenty-five-year-old acting extremely twenty-five.

Despite being the twenty-something who made his idol Allen Ginsberg feel talentless when he first played him “Hard Rain,” he’s also a twenty-something who’d tease and ignore his girlfriend on tour, taunt his own young fans for liking his hits just a bit too much, and lash out at prying older journalists like he was caught eating dessert before dinner. And, for someone widely considered to be in the Mount Rushmore of Cool Guys from the ‘60s, he visibly cares so much about looking cool. As Patti Smith described it in an interview with Criterion about Dont Look Back, the film “[encompasses] the hubris of youth” as well as “art, poetry, [and] the perfect sunglasses.”

Speaking to my own experience with the film, I first watched it last year as I was just getting into Dylan. I’d connected with those records released between ’63 and ’65, fell in love with their intimate atmosphere and lyrical turns between real and surreal, sober and outright silly. Still, I just didn’t get it: how did these records become pop sensations? Why were teenagers so obsessed with songs that would decades later win their author the Nobel Prize for Literature? As fate would have it, it turned out everyone at the time had the same thought. It was a revelation seeing journalists, fans, and peers alike marvel at just how the hell he did it, in a way that makes the strength of those records even more potent to me.

There’s a common refrain when people ask about “getting into Dylan”: to understand Dylan, just listen to the songs. True enough. But if you ask me, to understand Dylan as a phenomenon, just watch Dont Look Back.

Join us at Studio Two Three on June 13th at 7:30PM (doors at 7PM). More information and tickets here.

Tongues Untied (1989) dir. Marlon Riggs – Kyle M-B

When we think of the state of black cinema in America during the 1980s, the state of black people on screen is at an all-time low. Unlike the boom of blacksploitation in the 1970s and the yet-to-come gangster film boom of the 1990s, the 1980s served as a time in which black stories and characters took a backseat. If you weren’t Eddie Murphy and you weren’t starring alongside a white co-star with top billing, then it was extremely difficult to get a film made or seen if you were a black filmmaker. That only makes Marlon Riggs 1989 film Tongues Untied even more of a revolutionary act.

Centering the experiences and ideas of black gay men at its core, Tongues Untied paints a picture of proud and deeply cultured people who are tired of their lives and humanity being stripped away from them. The film fluctuates between spoken word poetry and documentary footage that all helps to translate a culture that was blind to most, even within black communities.

We are immensely excited to bring this film to the community as part of our Pride Month programming. We will also be showcasing some short films from the 2025 Queer Cinema for Palestine “No Pride in Genocide” short film program before the film that we hope you can join us for. We were happy to apply as a partner and even happier to be approved to bring these amazing shorts to Richmond. While we’ll only be showing a selection of the shorts, you can explore the full program here.

Join us at Studio Two Three on June 22nd at 7:30PM (Doors at 7PM). More information and tickets here.

What We’re Into: June 9th Edition

Tommy Jenkins

Tommy has been into:
-Ever since I got sick a few weeks ago and watched Tsai Ming-liang’s first four movies in one day, I’ve been working through his filmography in chronological order. My favorites so far have been The Hole (1999), What Time Is It There? (2001) and I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone (2006).
-Watching all the Tsai movies has led to me Shazamming a large number of Mandopop oldies by Grace Chang, Yao Lee, and Tsui Ping, whose music I highly recommend checking out if you are not familiar.
-For newer music, Dariacore grandmaster/snare drum alchemist leroy has made a long-awaited return to SoundCloud with the new single “XO TOUR LLIF3,” which has been on repeat in my car. Will we get a new leroy album in 2025?
-Generally, I’ve been really enjoying this mild spring weather here in Richmond and trying to spend lots of time outside before the heat rolls in for the summer.

Sylvie Miller

Sylvie has been into:
-Cleaning their baseboards
-Spackling
-Mulling over paint samples (Green, obviously)
-Mutton sleeves
-Perfectly intact vintage bathrooms
-Slippery elm
-Buying new shirts for their cat
-Lowering their instagram screen time reminder to try to be less online

Lewis Peterson

Lewis has been into:
-A Room With a View dir. James Ivory
-reading Charlotte Bronte’s Wuthering Heights & being glad that’s not My Life
-reconnecting with old friends
-exploring the parks and museums of Spain
-Steve McQueen’s incredible series “Small Axe”
-the fact that it’s Aperol Spritz season
-looking for interesting birds while im abroad
-Andrei Tarkovsky’s absolute masterpiece Nostalghia
–Todd Haynes in conversation with Jeremy O Harris

Warner West

Warner has been into:
-Watching his OKC Thunder in the Finals for the first time since middle school (and subsequently sufferin’ or hootin’ and hollerin’ depending on the night)
-Satyajit Ray; all of him. I had seen Apu Trilogy in the past, but I’ve watched another couple over the past few weeks and love him so much. I highly recommend Devi, The Big City and Days and Nights in the Forest.
-Strawberries: mainly in smoothies, occasionally in salads.
-The “This Had Oscar Buzz” podcast. I’d heard the guests on my beloved “Blank Check” in the past, but I love the banter about random almost-Oscar bad movies like Finding Forrester or Saltburn.
-Alan Rudolph! He’s a bit of a curiosity as an Altman-mentee, but I’ve really enjoyed his early filmography lately. I heard his run from Choose Me on is where it’s really at, but I loved Remember By Name as a weird almost-erotic thriller mixed with Hitchcock riff.
-The movie Nashville (1975). It’s a life-changer that I’ve watched 2.5 times in the last 4 days.

Jack Wolfe

Jack has been into:
-Addison Rae’s Debut Album “Addison” like woah that album is full of catchy hooks
-Making homemade ice cream (this week’s have been cherry vanilla, and thin mint)
-Elden Ring Nightreign (I’d dabbled in fromsoft games before but this was the first one to really catch me, maybe I need to give Elden Ring another shot)
-Turning off Instagram notifications
-The Criterion Live channel (the closest we will ever get to stumbling upon a film on TCM again)
-Using anamorphic lenses for still photography
-The Moog Messenger
-Binging Game Changer on dropout

Rental Library Staff Picks

As a reminder, we have a giant rental library of hand-picked and curated movies that we have for our Hard Light members to borrow and watch! With more Hard Light members and more rental library usage, we’ll continue to add more movies (including more Criterions!) that suit the genres, directors, and eras y’all enjoy. Sign up to be a Hard Light Member and read about all of the cool perks here and check out our current rental library on this Letterboxd list.

Tommy: Cloverfield. Maybe the most 2008 movie of all time. To me, Cloverfield will always be a late-night, cousins’ house scary movie sleepover classic. It’s sort of like Godzilla if it was about New York City yuppies. People love to hate on the found footage genre nowadays but hear me out: this movie is fun as hell, it’s such a good time.

Sylvie: The Royal Tenenbaums. Wes Anderson was a big part of my baby cinephile journey in high school. Movies had always been a part of my life, but it wasn’t until I got older that I really found my love for film. My mom showed me old Hollywood musicals and 80s films she loved growing up. We would watch TCM together a lot. As I got older I started stumbling across things online and flipping through channels finding things like Eyes Wide Shut, Amélie, and Donnie Darko. I don’t remember how I came across Wes Anderson but I’ll never forget watching Moonrise Kingdom and The Royal Tenenbaums. There was a refreshing realism to his characters despite existing in such a stylized world that I hadn’t really seen on screen before. They were blunt and depressed and hated their parents. And they looked So Cool. Margot Tenenbaum’s short bob and kohl liner had quite a hold on me. And don’t even get me started on the music. Despite no longer being an angsty pretentious teenager, there will always be a place in my heart for these early Anderson films.

Lewis: Raising Arizona. The second film from the Coen Brothers is that rare example of filmmakers avoiding a sophomore slump. It has an absolutely bonkers premise & is played straight with electric performances from the cast (Nicolas Cage, Holly Hunter, & John Goodman to name a few). If you’ve never seen it, you simply must let yourself experience this. It’s a movie my dad showed me when I was a child and to this day it’s one of my favorite memories I have with him. We even reminisced about it on his deathbed. That’s how much I love Raising Arizona. Tt changed my life, & it never fails to make me cry by the end. It’s a fabulous film about loving & creating a family on your own terms. And I think it may have the best opening setup to credits scene I’ve ever seen. It’s one of them ones!!!!

Warner: Run Lola Run. I was going to plug a Wes Anderson movie because of his new release, but I’ve had Cloud Atlas and Krzysztof Kieslowski on the brain lately and I wanted another 1998 pick to match Velvet Goldmine, so I’m plugging Run Lola Run! It’s a techno-thriller riff on Blind Chance that goes pretty gonzo in a beautifully 1998 way. It’s a real treat that makes for an easy weeknight watch with friends.

Jack: City Lights. This movie is pure magic on the silver screen. In what can be described as a vaguely homoerotic rom-com, it follows the tramp (Charlie Chaplin) and his nighttime adventures with an alcoholic millionaire with memory problems (Harry Meyers) and a blind flower girl who becomes the object of the tramps affection (Virginia Cherrill). This was the first of Chaplin’s films where he composed the film score in one of his productions. Clocking in at just under 90 minutes, this film is a perfect choice if you want to laugh, cry, and be inspired by the magic of cinema.

What’s Up Next?

June 12th: Velvet Goldmine at Tilt.
June 13th: Dont Look Back at Studio Two Three.
June 22nd: Tongues Untied at Studio Two Three.