Because of You: A History of Kilawin Kolektibo

“Are you a lesbian? Here’s my card… Are you a dyke? Call me.” Between zany pick-up lines and cheeky call-outs, this documentary is quite the charmer–full of sweet talking chismis and hugot from the heart! BECAUSE OF YOU is a kaleidoscopic portrait of Kilawin Kolektibo–a pioneering Pinay Queer Collective based in New York City in the mid-nineties. Through a series of iconic archival footage and modern-day accounts laden with massage-train interviews and camp singalongs–community members trace the heartfelt intricacies of their political affiliations and attractions, flirting between the crossfires of memory and possibility: Who were we to each other? Where are we now? Filmmakers and former members, Barbara Malaran and Desireena Almoradie reunite to both preserve and transform their shared history altogether.

Part community scrapbook, part personal diary, this film is a love-letter to the Barkada, passed between eager hands and bursting at the seams with queer utopic desire. Communities may change, but collectivity lives on. Equal parts tender and plucky, BECAUSE OF YOU embraces its own nostalgia, piecing together a collective memory unapologetically welcoming of all the ways we rise and fall to our deeply human need for belonging.

– Che’Li

Preceded By

So To Speak

Directed by Celine Parreñas Shimizu

A Filipina American college student uses art to encourage new sexualities for herself and other Asian American women.

specters and bones

Directed by Ashley Dequilla

Experimental documentary of the submerged legacy of Dr. William Jones (1871-1909).