And The Oscar Goes Too.....

I can’t lie. At first I have to be honest I was not excited to go and see this film Is What Was, but it turns out is was a very interesting film. Watching it was an eye opening experience. I was so impressed with what Professor Jerry Tartaglia constructed. F.Y.I Tartaglia got the idea for the film, Is What Was, when he went to visit a concentration came in Germany. Tartaglia wants people to have an understanding of the gay community during World War II.
Trust me it was not a Hollywood production but I had to look past that.
This film focuses on the queer identity of men during World War II. He showed picture of the Nazi soldiers during their time off duty and how someone could get the impression that they were gay, because of the way they bathed together, laid around and just sometimes did not wear cloths. He raises the question should we touchier the soldiers because they look gay in a photograph? The film was very descriptive; showing where the gays were touchier.
I talked to three different people after the movie. I talked to an Albright Professor and two students that came to see the film and there were mixed reviews. The professor had the opinion that it was a “very well done, smart, fresh film.” While one student found it “boring and a waist of his time” the other student found it “interesting, but maybe that is because I would like to make films one day. The part that I really enjoyed was the realization of the film and how people look past the religion of the war and see another side to it.”
Tartagila wants to bring talk about the Queer past but because of how close minded people were back then it is hard to dig into the Queer history to find answers. This was a very eye opening film because I never would have thought to talk about gays during the war. All you ever hear people talk about is the Jews and Nazi. The final thing that Tartaglia point out is that there is a difference between Gays and homosexuals. Homosexuals is a horrible word because it has such a horrible past that come with the word and n today’s society gay is what people should be called.