Art on Film @ 21c: Funeral Parade of Roses

Pull up a chair or get cozy with your own pillow and a blanket for a showing of Funeral Parade of Roses in the 21c galleries.

Director Toshio Matsumoto’s shattering, kaleidoscopic masterpiece is one of the most subversive and intoxicating films of the late 1960s: a headlong dive into a dazzling, unseen Tokyo night-world of drag queen bars and fabulous divas, fueled by booze, drugs, fuzz guitars, performance art and black mascara. No less than Stanley Kubrick cited the film as a direct influence on his own dystopian classic A Clockwork Orange.

An unknown club dancer at the time, transgender actor Peter (from Kurosawa’s Ran) gives an astonishing Edie Sedgwick/Warhol superstar-like performance as hot young thing Eddie, hostess at Bar Genet — where she’s ignited a violent love-triangle with reigning drag queen Leda (Osamu Ogasawara) for the attentions of club owner Gonda (played by Kurosawa regular Yoshio Tsuchiya, from Seven Samuri and Yojimbo).

• This film is not rated but covers adult themes and topics. Please watch the trailer here.

This is a free event! In leiu of buying a ticket please consider donating to NWA Equality, Arkansas’ only comprehensive community organization for LGBTQ people. When you donate to NWA Equality, you help provide programming, education, and advocacy services that connect and empower the Northwest Arkansas LGBTQ community to thrive as complete members of society.