It Used to Be Witches: under the spell of queer cinema, with author Ryan Gilbey

An authoritative celebration of the past, present and future of queer cinema.

Playfully blending personal memoir, criticism and candid new interviews with filmmakers from across the LGBTQ+ spectrum, Ryan Gilbey’s engaging and dynamic It Used to be Witches is a non-chronological treasure-hunt through queer cinema past and present. Andrew Haigh (All of Us Strangers), Cheryl Dunye (The Watermelon Woman), Isabel Sandoval (Lingua Franca) and Bruce LaBruce (No Skin Off My Ass) are among the directors who reveal how queer artists use film to express their most personal truths – and to challenge, defy and outrage a world that would rather they didn’t exist.

That world might look rainbow-coloured from some angles, with the likes of Brokeback Mountain, Call Me By Your Name, Moonlight and Portrait of a Lady on Fire winning awards and acclaim. But as queer and trans people find themselves increasingly under attack, It Used to Be Witches asks whether cinema can be an effective weapon of resistance and change, and celebrates an outlaw spirit which refuses to die.

Ryan Gilbey has been writing on film for more than 30 years. He was named the Independent/Sight and Sound Young Film Journalist of the Year in 1993, won a Press Gazette award for his reviews at the New Statesman, where he was film critic from 2006 until 2023, and has written for the Guardian since 2002. He is the author of It Don’t Worry Me, about 1970s US cinema, and a study of Groundhog Day in the BFI Modern Classics series. He lives in London.

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