Nitrate Kisses (1992)

Visually structured around four couples making love, one couple at a time; narratively structured around four chapters in lesbian life: older women talking about what it was like in the 30s, 40s and 50s; a look at the hidden eroticism of movies; the repression of gays under the Third Reich; and, the work of the Lesbian Herstory Archives in New York City. The narrative voices and the couples making love share the film with photographs, movie outtakes, newsreel archives, and individuals relating events in their lives. The film calls lesbians to tell their stories; it also dramatizes the importance of telling the story of the loss of stories. —