At Queerguru we like nothing better to bring you the best of indie queer cinema, the edgier the better …. and even better still if it’s real gritty. We were thrilled then to learn that the peeps at Kino Lorber are re-releasing Juliet Bashore’s award winning KAMIKAZE HEARTS from 1986.
This 2K newly restored lesbian classic captures an intense queer relationship in 1980s San Francisco underground porn scene. Bashore’s quasi-documentary plunge into the 1980s porn industry takes an unsparing look at issues of misogyny, drug abuse, and exploitation via the story of two women – the naive newcomer Tigr and her partner, the magnetic, imperious porn veteran Sharon Mitchell – caught in a toxic romance. By turns mesmerizing and unsettling, Kamikaze Hearts is both a fascinating record of the pre-gentrification of San Francisco’s X-rated underground and an intense, searing love story. The film offers a raw and uncensored glimpse at the modification of bodies, feelings, and lives.
At the time of its original release, Alisa Solomon wrote in The Village Voice “In Juliet Bashore’s Kamikaze Hearts…there are no taboos left to break. Only the camera, with verité charm, trembles during kisses here.
The film is already available to rent or buy on KINO NOW, and then on June 28 will be available to stream on most major platforms