Kokomo City

Kokomo City is a vibrant, original work, shot in black and white, in a kaleidoscopic blend of monologues, conversations, and re-enactments. At a moment when the American right are obsessed with criminalizing health care for transgender people and erasing Black history, it’s also timely.

Punchy delivery styles, shimmering personalities and kaleidoscopic perspectives make up the soul of D. Smith’s gutsy documentary Kokomo City

It culminates in a bold exploration of transness, womanhood, Blackness and the sex industry, providing thoughtful and intimate insight into these material conditions and the breadth of experience that lies behind them.

The questions may not be pre-approved by GLAAD, but they’re coming from a trans woman actively working against the usual feel-good talking points; the responses she gets are frank, funny and frequently shocking.

Kokomo City, D. Smith’s impressive debut documentary about Black trans sex workers, arrives in time to be an audacious, endearing, illuminating, often amusingly ribald primer.

As with a lot of first-time feature filmmakers, Smith shows a tendency to want to throw everything a her film stylistically – including, at one point, the random use of bright yellow subtitles – which makes certain sections feel unnecessarily skittish.

The film’s most significant accomplishment is the mood it crafts with its cool black-and-white images, fast-paced editing, unorthodox camera angles, handheld camera, and overall jazzy atmosphere.

It's impressive how gripping a documentary can be that only lives from the narrated portraits of its protagonists. How the form of the documentary is played with in both the 'talking head' sequences and the almost experimental-looking cutscenes, the narrative is illustrated and re-contextualized. How music is played with, different filmmaking **** course, every documentary of this kind stands or falls with the selection of those documented. And these four women are simply amazing. I could listen to their stories for many more hours. And delight in the incredibly beautiful photography.Conclusion: Technically great documentary that playfully manages to translate the thoughts and feelings of its protagonists into cinematic images.

Divertidíssimo e interessante documentário sobre o submundo da prostituição de mulheres trans, com depoimentos que nos fazem refletir sobreo quão fluida é nossa sexualidade. Particularmente, gosto sobre como o documentário trata a prostituição, sem aquele peso moral, embora não negue seus riscos. A fotografia em preto e branco ficou linda. Por pouco ir às ruas e mais colher depoimentos mesmo, de forma íntima, acredito que aproximou as meninas do espectador, porém, depois da metade o doc dá uma cansada, compensado pela sua duração curta.

I often find it fascinating when a documentary provides viewers with an in-depth, inside look at a world seldom seen by those who aren’t part of it, yet that’s clearly the greatest strength of this debut feature from filmmaker D. Smith. This captivating examination of the lives of four African-American transgender sex workers in New York, Atlanta and Miami shares stories of their experiences, their outlooks on their vocation and how they view themselves in relation to the Black community at large. It also features interviews with the clients and supporters of these individuals and how they relate to one another, both as objects of desire and sometimes as loving, adoring friends/partners. Beautifully shot in black-and-white, the film holds little back in telling the stories of its subjects, both in terms of dialogue and images (so sensitive viewers take note). And, for its efforts, the picture has been widely honored by film festivals and critics associations, as well as a recipient of best documentary nominations by the Independent Spirit Awards, the Critics Choice Documentary Awards and the Directors Guild of America. That’s quite an impressive pedigree for a film that might not have even been made not all that long ago. It’s a real testament to how far we – and cinema – have come over the years.

The first scene features 1 of the 4 featured Black trans sex workers talking about a potentially lethal encounter with a trick (they call them "clients"). From there, this doc features these women discussing their experiences in very frank and expletive-laden vernacular. It also includes a few men who have a personal connection with the workers. D. Smith, who shot (in black & white), directed and edited, uses an arty, yet gritty style that perfectly suits the subject. This cinematic exploration of their lives also addresses their issues with acceptance by the Black community. This doc proves a fascinating, hold-holds-barred discussion of these women's joys and struggles, but it does get repetitive and even at 1:15 could have been shorter.