Please note: The screening time has been changed to 9 pm and the reception for VIP ticket holders will start from 8 pm.
"Taking Woodstock is a gentle, meandering celebration of personal liberation at a moment when rigid social barriers were becoming more permeable, at least among the young," wrote Stephen Holden one of the three main film critics at The New York Times which has designated the film 'Critic's Pick.' "The movie explicitly connects Woodstock to the gay-liberation movement and the Stonewall riots, which took place two months earlier that summer."
Top of page: Demetri Martin (as Elliot Tiber) with Liev Schreiber (as Vilma). Last picture: Emile Hirsch and director Ang Lee on the set.
Directed by Academy Award-winning director Ang Lee (who brought us what were to become gay classics The Wedding Banquet and Brokeback Mountain), Taking Woodstock is based on the memoirs of a young gay man Elliot Tiber (Demetri Martin). Tiber, then a struggling young interior designer in New York City, had recently returned to his parents’ rundown motel in the Catskill Mountains when he heard that a planned concert had lost its permit from the neighbouring town of Wallkill. He then called producer Michael Lang (Jonathan Groff) at Woodstock Ventures providing a much-needed performance permit and offering his motel as the production headquarters. The 1969 Woodstock Music and Arts Festival, which attracted 500,000 people, turned out to be one of the most iconic events of the hippie generation and is today widely regarded to be one of the greatest and most pivotal moments in popular music history.
In his memoir Taking Woodstock: A True Story of a Riot, a Concert and a Life, Tiber who's now 74 says he was present at the Stonewall Riots on June 28, 1969 and had met the likes of Marlon Brando, Rock Hudson, Truman Capote and Tennessee Williams.
In the film, Tibor takes inspiration from Vilma (Liev Schreiber), a kind-hearted, hulking cross-dressing Marine who is hired to manage the motel’s security.
"I thought it would help the story about how Elliot transforms over the course of the movie, how he is able to come to terms with who he is maybe a little bit more through Vilma. That if someone like Vilma can exist in the world, so why couldn't someone like Elliot?" Schreiber (Sabretooth in X-Men Origins: Wolverine) told gay radio programme This Way Out in an interview about his character Vilma, a strapping Korean War veteran.
"I thought that it's good that that Vilma embodies some of the contradictions of sexuality. In other words, she's very big, she's 6-foot-3, 220 pounds and relatively muscular person has these tattoos from the war and yet chooses to live in this incredibly effeminate way."
The film also stars Emile Hirsch as a young Vietnam War veteran suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Hirsch was recently seen in Gus Van Sant's Oscar winning Milk, in which he starred as real-life activist Cleve Jones.
100% of ticketing proceeds will go towards funding gay-related community projects. Since 2005, Fridae has organised six movie-fundraisers raising over S$60,000 in benefit of a variety of NGOs including Action for AIDS, AWARE, Cat Welfare Society; two independent short films by Boo Junfeng and Loo Zihan; and Indignation - which Fridae has financially and in other ways supported since it was first held in 2005. Pink Dot, the first-ever official LGBT public gathering held in May 2008 in Singapore, was also a beneficiary of Fridae's Milk Fundraising Gala Premiere held earlier this year.
"In the past few years, our community has grown in visibility, maturity, as well as diversity of activities more than in any other span of time. Events such as the Repeal 377A campaign, PinkDot, and the Aware Saga have been watershed moments for our community," said Dr Stuart Koe, CEO of Fridae. "'Indignation' continues to ask the right questions and push the envelope for equality and recognition. Fiercely independent filmmakers such as Boo Junfeng and Loo Zihan are creating bodies of work that tell our stories and record them for posterity. And they have been made possible in part because of your support. Together, we can make so much happen."
Tickets are available online at fridae.asia/takingwoodstock.
Taking Woodstock Fundraising Gala Premiere
Date: 30 Sep 2009 (Wednesday)
Time: 9 pm (Reception for VIPs from 8 pm)
Venue: Shaw Lido 1 (Shaw Centre, Scotts Road)
Tickets**: USS$7 (Zuji Promotion) / US$10 (Standard) / US$35 (VIP*)
* VIP Tickets include goodie bags, pre-show reception and premium seats.
**100% of ticketing proceeds will go towards the gay-related community projects.