'Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen' Review: Netflix docu gauges how Hollywood has fared with inclusivity so far
From 1997's French film 'Ma Vie en Rose' to some of today's most popular prime time shows — transgender representation in Hollywood has come a long way. Or has it? Laverne Cox and Sam Feder team up to gauge the same in the originally Sundance Film Festival premiered documentary film 'Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen' — Netflix's classic nod to Pride Month. Sprinkled with a tone of positivity amid haunting reminders of the miles the industry still has to go, the narrative presents us with thousands of clips, some from half a century ago and some prominent in today's pop culture — all used to draw parallel and contrast the caricature that trans-characters were on screen and their current portrayal as multidimensional characters with proper arcs.
'Disclosure' highlights certain niches of transgender representation that are missed during the bigger picture, such as the need for a majorly trans crew when telling a story about a trans-character. But that isn't Hollywood's biggest crime in terms of transgender representation according to the many pioneers in Feder's documentary. "The paradox of our representation is, the more we are seen, the more we are violated," the film tells its viewers, addressing the culture shock trans representation has caused, and also how for the longest time transgender people being deemed as a mentally ill commodity might have contributed to the stigma surrounding the minority.
We see some of the biggest names of the industry take the hot seat, divulging their experience as a trans person, both onscreen as well as watching another trans person up there. The most alarming, yet crushing one is that of writer Zeke Smith's, when he opens up about rewatching his favorite childhood movie 'Ace Ventura: Pet Detective' as an adult and being morbidly disgusted by the way it shames and mocks a trans-person. "My favorite movie as a kid ends with a room full of people throwing up at the sight of a trans person," Smith opens up about watching the Jim Carrey starter while he was transitioning.
Smith's reaction isn't an isolated one. "Do you know that feeling when you're sitting in a movie theatre, and everyone's laughing at something and you just don't get it?" — passive-aggressive, yet poignant at the same time, these are the questions that the wide ensemble cast asks. It refers to all the caricature and the inherently suspicious, duplicitous and evil air that most cross-dressing characters on screen were dumped with. Some would call Jared Letto's 'Dallas Buyer's Club' avatar an outrageous representation of a transgender prostitute, but even that was over five years ago. Today we have Billy Porter sashaying the community in his series 'Pose' and actors like Candis Cayne, Ser Anzoategui, Elliot Fletcher and Hailie Sahar taking the stage by storm, once again insisting on how far inclusivity has come from being a disgraceful taboo to a much-needed norm.
Cox takes charge of the narrative as she beams into the camera giving that comforting vibe of solidarity, speaking at length about her experience — both watching trans people on screen down the years and even playing one. She quips about the atrocities the community has been plagued with, in a manner that's both amusing and somehow unsettling at the same time because she isn't making up stories. Feder's direction is equally crisp, yet it somehow shrouds us with the generously sized safe space he offers his speakers within the camera.
Ambitious, touching and quite impactful with the way it tallies and examines and estimates Hollywood's seemingly progressing stand on minority representation, the paradox of visibility and exclusion walk hand in hand. Still, 'Disclosure' wants to hope for a better future where trans people aren't a commodity for crude laughter or props for political correctness anymore. It shouldn't be far, considering how invested pillars of the entertainment industry like Lilly Wachowski and Mj Rodriguez are in this venture.
'Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen' premiers on Netflix this Friday, June 19.