Glitter comes from a rich family, but wants to be a circus clown. Doom is a singer-songwriter from poor surroundings, trying to break into the local club scene. While Glitter has an over-abundance of self-confidence, Doom has self-doubts. They meet, and have under a month to fall in love, before Glitter leaves for clown school in Paris. Meanwhile, Doom needs to produce a promotional music track to confirm his breakout club gig.
The music is from the Indigo Girls, repurposed, rearranged, and sometimes mashed up. The songs are sung by the two principals, with a small ensemble doing some dancing around them at times. The entire combination has a magical effect.
I saw this at its world premiere at the Inside Out 2SLGBT+ Toronto Film Festival, with a fair number of the talent present. The queer filmmakers were Indigo Girls fans, and mildly surprised that Indigo Girls gave them permission to use their catalog of 300+ songs. That, in turn, helped them secure financing. Still, they shot in Mexico for budgetary reasons, while organically assembling a team that was much drawn from the queer community. Being done during the covid era, they did find a geographically diverse cast.
This was the Closing Night Gala of the festival, and I think it did a good job of leaving a good final impression on the audience.
