Product Description

The award-winning PARIS IS BURNING has been igniting audiences and critics across the country and all over the world with record-breaking box office performances. An unblinking behind-the-scenes story of fashion-obsessed New Yorkers who created "voguing" and drag balls, and turned these raucous celebrations into a powerful expression of fierce personal pride. This world-within-a-world is instantly familiar, filled with ambitions, desires, and yearnings that reflect America itself. Paris Is Burning is an intimate portrait of one urban community, a world in which the allure of high fashion, status, and wealth becomes an affirmation of love, acceptance, and joy.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #21500 in DVD
• Brand: BUENA VISTA HOME VIDEO
• Released on: 2005-09-06
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 71 minutes

Customer Reviews

Defiance and Pathos
In the beginning of this film, one of the commentators says that he was told that he has two strikes against him: he is black and male. But in addition to that, he has a third strike: he's gay. "You're going to have to be stronger than you ever imagined," he is told. "Paris is Burning" is a documentary about gay black and Hispanic men who are tranvestites (men who dress in women's clothing) or transsexuals (people who have The Operation and become, biologically, the opposite sex). They come together and hold "balls" in which they compete in categories like "Executive Realness," "Opulence," and "the Boy Who Robbed You a Few Minutes before Arriving at the Ball." Although several of these categories seem like a satire of society at large, we are told by elder stateswoman/cynic/voice of reason Dorian Corey that "this isn't a parody or take-off. They are very seriously trying to pass as what they are dressing up as." The miracle of "Paris is Burning" is that director Jennie Livingston takes a subject that could have very easily become a freak show and allows the people in it their humanity. We learn their views of homosexuality, men, women, their hopes, their disappointments, their dreams. [...]
This is not a film for everyone. There are shots in this movie of nude transsexuals. It is definitely not for children, and if you have a problem with homosexuality, then this movie isn't for you, either. But if you do see this movie you'll realize "Paris is Burning" isn't really about men wearing women's clothes, it's about a group of people who are routinely marginalized and put down by society at large, and what they do to get a sense of community in their lives.
I've watched this movie four times since it was released in 1991, because it says so many things: it's a commentary about materialism in our culture, about gender roles, about rich and poor people, about the media and what it celebrates, about fame and adulation. "Paris is Burning" is one of the most humane, and one of the saddest, movies I've ever seen.

Brilliant time capsule
It's hard to believe that the goings on in Paris Is Burning is almost 20 years old. I saw it in a Midtown Atlanta theater in 1992, and was just blown away by it. The whole notion that people scrabble for a bare existence 99% of their time so they can shine for 1% sounds cute or depressing or trite, depending on your current level of treacle versus cynicism... But once you see people honest to God living that way, that patronizing distance is gone. A really good film. Really, really good.

ANY SHOPLIFTER CAN GET A LABEL...
I first saw this movie in 1991 during my first week at Hampshire College at some theater in Northampton Massachussetts. I was about 17 and had just come out as a latino gay male. I cannot begin to tell you how this movie impacted my life. Paris is Burning has given be comic material and one-liners for well over a decade. Regardless of class, race, or gender, my circle of friends can recite at least one brilliant line from the movie. The DVD has new outtakes and some choice commentary by the very wise and articulate Dorian Corey. Dorian discusses the lack of imagination that exists among today's youth as a result of their reliance on popular media for entertainment. Furthermore, the "ball scene" is a parody of the social paradigm, where roles are played and an outfit, designer label, or the ability to "pass", brings the marginalized individual one step closer to the "American Dream", if only for that fleeting moment on the ballroom floor. "At one time or another we have all lusted to walk a ballroom floor".