Welcome to Unstreamable! A column where I, arts writer and Scarecrow librarian Jas Keimig, recommend films and shows you can’t watch on major streaming services in the United States.
This week, I have some exciting news to announce: Unstreamable is back at Northwest Film Forum and we’re cooking up some really fun screenings. Kicking us off is unstreamable gem, BY HOOK OR BY CROOK (2001), which is showing at NWFF on June 18, 20-21. I’m so stoked to be back where Unstreamable’s screening series first started and PSYCHED to screen this film in particular. You know what to do – go cop a ticket right now. See you there?
Got a recommendation for Unstreamable? Gimme the scoop at unstreamablemovies@gmail.com.
United States, 2001, 98 min, Dirs. Silas Howard and Harry Dodge
Even though it was filmed and released more than two decades ago, Harry Dodge and Silas Howard’s By Hook or By Crook feels as refreshing and daring as anything released today. The film follows Shy (Howard), a trans guy who leaves his po-dunk small town after the death of his father for gay-ass San Francisco. It’s there he meets Valentine (Dodge), an eccentric adoptee looking for his birth mom and chaotically dating Billie (Stanya Kahn). With barely a nickel to split between them and living on the fringes of society, Shy and Val decide to embark on a life of crime.
By Hook or By Crook was Dodge and Howard’s first film, which they say they dreamt up as a plan for “financial security” following the indie success Kevin Smith’s Clerks. Shot on tinny digital video by director of photography Ann T. Rossetti (of another lesbian classic, Go Fish), there’s a DIY spirit that pervades the film. Both director/actors give emotional depth to their respective characters and explore the queerphobia, classism, and social instability without being too preachy. While Shy and Val’s circumstances might be a little tragic, they themselves are not. I wish I had seen this as a kid!
Find it on DVD in the LGBT section.
FROM THE UNSTREAMABLE ARCHIVE (AKA 2021)
United Kingdom, 1989, 45 min, Dir. Isaac Julien
Isaac Julien’s Looking for Langston lasts under an hour but feels like it expertly encompasses an entire lifetime. I attribute that feeling to the film’s dreamlike logic: its mish-mash of archival footage and staged scenes; narration composed of works by the titular Langston Hughes and other Black thinkers like Essex Hemphill and Stuart Hall; the fuzzy and elegant black and white film used to shoot the entire movie. It’s Julien’s impressionistic and surreal ode to the life and legacy of Hughes, centering and reclaiming the celebrated Black poet as a queer figure.
Using Hughes as a jumping-off point, Julien thoughtfully explores desire, the nature of being a Black artist, the cultural legacy of the Harlem Renaissance, and his own experiences as a gay man. He turns scenes that seemingly take place within a ’20s speakeasy in Harlem into gay raves in London. Hemphill’s explicit poetry—”I could throw my legs up/like satellites, but I knew/I was fucking fallen angels”—is layered over scenes of dapper Black men dressed in tails cruising each other. It’s hot and melancholic and fantastical all at once. The openly gay nature of Looking for Langston caused an uproar during the film’s release, with the Hughes estate demanding that some scenes be censored. Regardless, the film is a wondrous monument to the gay history of Harlem, as well as its most famous poet.— 2021
Find it in the Essential Black Cinema section.
Looking for more? Browse our big list of 400+ hard-to-find movies over on our website. This column also publishes on Substack as a newsletter. Give us a follow over there.
*The fine print: Unstreamable means we couldn’t find it on Netflix, Hulu, Shudder, Disney+, or any of the other hundreds of streaming services available in the United States. We also couldn’t find it available for rent or purchase through platforms like Prime Video or iTunes. Yes, we know you can find many things online illegally, but we don’t consider user-generated videos, like unauthorized YouTube uploads, to be streamable.
