Stonewall (1995)

I have not seen the movie yet. I am sure that there will be a lot of fiction as well as non-fiction. If you really want to know the facts, ask me. I was 17 at the time, dancing the night away in Stonewall. We had no idea or even a thought we would be making history. This was not planned nor was it ever in anyway rehearsed. It was a sad time, a very scary time. We were always under the threat of the police dept, under the mayors office. We were never sure if we were going to be taken outside one more time for a shake down. I read a lot of the reviews here and some were on and off. I can tell you this though, Judy Garlands death had NOTHING what so ever to do with Stonewall.

Having been the the Village in the 1960's, I can vouch for the accuracy of this film and the depiction of the Village during that era, except for a sort of inaccurate image of the exterior of the Stonewall bar.The characters are representations of real people (the head of the Mattachine Society, the leader of the Daughters of Bilitis, the mafioso and the queen coming out) that I knew in the movement back then.Being gay or trans gender back then was very rough: the scenes of police brutality are frank and graphic, especially the cops' dunking La Miranda's head under water... The cops did a similar thing to me.If you want to see how far the LGBT movement has progressed, see this film.

We are set in the year 1969 where Homosexuality is illegal and dressing in drag is likely to get you arrested, if not beaten!Everybody has their own Stonewall story... Everyone that lived through it will have a fantastic memory to tell anybody that will listen. Well this film is La Miranda's story. La Miranda is a fictional drag queen and this film is all about how her and her friends got through the Stonewall days.I learned a lot from this film. I never realised how tough it was for gay people living in America at that time. I never once thought about what those people did to make life so much easier for us now. As a gay man myself, I felt touched by this film and the reality of what really did happen back then.Stonewall is a brutal film that delivers a very strong message in a very straight forward, no crap, right to the point kind of way. The characters in the film are all adorable in their own way and you can really feel what they are feeling.You will find yourself staring at the screen in amazement at how strong these people really are. Every person in this film gives an outstanding performance... I can not fault any of the actors. There are no big names in this film either and that is what makes it even more special.No big star actors being in this movie means that you can get really close to the characters and you can relate to them, rather than picture them in another role and another movie. It is also a very private movie, it wasn't a huge box office smash hit like Titanic or Star Wars. It's the kind of movie that nobody has really heard of but is always hooked on it once they finally see it.Anybody that knows about Stonewall will know that the people that lived through that riot were fighting for people like myself, my boyfriend and all gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, drag queens and everyone alike. They sacraficed everything they could to pave the way for us to live with the freedom we deserve. They deserve to be respected in every way possible and this film does just that. It portrays them for what they really are.... HEROS!I really loved this film and I seriously recommend everybody sees it... you will learn something and you will be moved!

I have a great deal of admiration for this engaging effort to explain the roots of the modern gay rights movement, produced on a shoe-string by a director with an admirable sense of style, pacing, and resourcefulness. Though filtered through a distinctly British class-consciousness, it does a highly respectable job of catching the main trends in gay America from my not-quite-misspent youth.Furthermore, it is candidly presented as a subjective, fictional account, mooting complaints like "the bus is too old," "no New York apartment is that big" and "the Stonewall bar never looked that clean."Nonetheless, one small detail and one large item are egregiously wrong. The detail is the rather elementary fact that the Stonewall was never licensed; it was a "private" mob-run club. It was raided not because all cops are homophobes but because, in the absence of official licensing, gay bars were, in every sense, illegal. The scenes where Stonewall employees display great care about the liquor laws are ridiculous, since the bar operated outside the law.The larger item is the failure to capture the sense of exhilaration that swept throught the country in 1969. This was the year men walked on the moon, the year of Woodstock, the year an X-rated gay-themed film ("Midnight Cowboy") won the "Best Picture" Oscar, and (biggest miracle of all to us New Yorkers) the year the Mets, long "lovable losers," won the World Series. Anything was possible, and gay people joined the party with enthusiasm.