Tangerine (dir. Sean Baker, 2015)
Just out of a four week stint in Los Angeles County lockup, Sin-Dee Rella (Kitana Kiki Rodriguez) connects with her best friend and fellow sex worker Alexandra (Mya Taylor) on Christmas Eve. Alexandra tells Sin-Dee that her pimp and boyfriend Chester (James Ransone) has been cheating on her these past weeks with someone woman named Dinah (Mickey O’Hagan). Sin-Dee, understandably incensed, begins her day long quest to track down Dinah and confront Chester. Elsewhere in Hollywood, an Armenian cab driver named Razmik (Karren Karagulian) makes his rounds around the neighborhood before attending his family’s Christmas dinner that night. These two storylines will collide at Donut Time.
A portrait of an underseen side of Los Angeles, Tangerine is probably best known for its unusual cinematography, having been filmed on three iPhone 5s. The digital photography gives the film its distinct look, and it is a triumph for it, but the real heart of the film is in its authentic and inimitable casting of transwomen in the lead. Rodriguez and Taylor are brilliant as their characters and every bit the equal to established actors like Ransone or a legend like Clu Culager.
More than that, Sean Baker and his co-writer Chris Bergoch appear to have listened to their actors, allowing them to truly collaborate in the creation of the story. There’s this thing that Roger Ebert said about film being an empathy machine, and I can think of few better examples of that than Tangerine. It is incredibly evenhanded, nonjudgmental, and unsentimental, depicting the characters and their lives as they are. It’s a real feat of filmmaking and storytelling.
oliveresque 