The Watermelon Woman

While I never felt it did anything really relevant, to witness a film from the 90's presenting a young black gay woman's experience so loosely without the need to exploit unnecessary drama was quite surprising to me. Certainly the script uses as a plot device a racial background as is the documentary that the protagonist is trying to put together, but this has more to do with the focus on identity that the director explores through that concept than something more thematically charged. Very low budget, but truly practical and effective.

There is a germ **** idea here. An African American lesbian, a budding filmmaker who works at a video store, becomes entranced by a minor black actress of the 1930's, known only as "Watermelon Woman". If this had been more of a road movie, it might have worked. But much of the film takes place in a video store. The film suffers from amateur actors, poor cinematography, and a weak plot. There is some resemblance to "Go Fish", which has a lot of the same flaws. Although there is some interest in seeing a community that rarely appears in films, and there is an interesting cameo with Camille Paglia, this film would mainly be of interest to those middle-aged lesbians who are willing to overlook its flaws.