FEMALE MISBEHAVIOR (1992)

Monika Treut presents four short documentaries about individuals who live and act outside of society’s expectations of womanhood. In Dr. Paglia (1992), Sexual Personae writer and academic Camille Paglia holds court with author Bruce Henderson. Then, in Annie (1989), “post-porn modernist” Annie Sprinkle gives a PCA (Public Cervix Announcement). Bondage (1983) is a look at lesbian sadomasochism with Carol from New York’s Lesbian Sex Mafia. Finally, in the groundbreaking Max (1992), trans poet Max Wolf Valerio discusses his life and transition. What emerges from these four very different portraits is a compelling snapshot of those at the forefront of blurring and expanding the definition of sex and gender at the close of the 20th century.

GENDERNAUTS (1999)

Made at the height of the tech boom of the late 1990s, Monika Treut’s Teddy Award-winning Gendernauts is a portrait of a group of trans artists, activists, and academics living in San Francisco—including historian Susan Stryker, web designer Stafford, video artists Jordy Jones and Texas Tomboy, intersex activist Hida Viloria, and “Goddess of Cyberspace” Sandy Stone. Treut also catches up with Annie Sprinkle and Max Wolf Valerio, who she first profiled in 1992’s Female Misbehavior. Viewed now, over 25 years since its initial release, Gendernauts remains a fascinatingly multifaceted look at the way that technology and the internet reshaped trans culture at the close of the 20th century.

GENDERATION (2021)

Twenty years after the making of her groundbreaking trans documentary Gendernauts, Monika Treut returns to San Francisco to catch up with her subjects and find out where time and life have led them. What she finds is a city transformed: what had once been a utopia for trans communities has now grown largely inaccessible due to rising costs and gentrification. Sandy Stone, Stafford, Susan Stryker, Max Wolf Valerio, and Annie Sprinkle all return in this lovely—if bittersweet—document of trans elderhood and enduring activism in the face of an affordability crisis and a repressive government.

Synopses courtesy of Muscle Distribution