Pink Narcissus (4K)

An extremely handsome, brooding, self-absorbed young man escapes the realities of his real world through a progression of exotic fantasies. Obsessed with his own perfection, he lives in a dreamworld of intense colors, magnificent music, elaborate costumes and strikingly handsome men. In a series of Walter Mitty-like sequences he imagines himself as a Roman slave chosen by the emperor, a triumphant matador vanquishing the bull (who is really a black leather clad cyclist), an innocent wood nymph gamboling in the woods, and a diaphanously dressed harem boy in the tent of the sheik. The room where he does his daydreaming is an exquisite jewel-encrusted retreat. But reality constantly intrudes through the visits of his "johns" and the harsh and ugly sounds of the streets and the depraved lives of those who inhabit them. His narcissistic enchantment with his own beauty and lifestyle is marred by one great fear – aging and the loss of his youth and good looks. Finally, a terrible glimpse of reality, the jaded "john" becomes himself. Synopsis for 1986 UK Theatrical Release by Mark Finch, Film Programmer and LGBT Film Scholar and Promoter (1961-1995) Even if you’ve never seen the glorious PINK NARCISSUS, you've probably dreamt about it. A young man escapes from the real world in a sequence of pink satin fantasies – he's a slave chosen by the emperor, a bullfighter, a wood nymph, a harem boy. PINK NARCISSUS has no story to speak of, but it feels compulsively pacey. Loved for its imaginative eroticism in 1971, it was also derided for campy content (“as many spangles, feathers and gilded costumes as in Ziegfeld Follies” protested Parker Tyler, a boy who should know). Fifteen years on, in a brand new Frameline print, you can begin to see – between the Walter Mitty premise and the “Beauty School Drop-Out” décor – a passionate intelligence, and the spirit of Genet. PINK NARCISSUS may appear narcissistic (and so what?), but it’s also cheekily about narcissism. While Hollywood was grappling with the gloss of gay life – how many nellie queens make a good party? – in BOYS IN THE BAND, PINK NARCISSUS set about scraping at the nitty gritty. It’s all here: caballeros and bike boys; striptease and tearoom sex. PINK NARCISSUS delves beyond the surface of gay fantasy and finds that there’s an expansive two-way mirror underneath. PRODUCTION NOTES In 1963 – the year Andy Warhol started making films, Kenneth Anger made SCORPIO RISING, and Jack Smith finished FLAMING CREATURES – James Bidgood began working on his first film, PINK NARCISSUS, an expansion of his work as a physique photographer in the late 50s and early 60s. Instead of the fairly staid, hyper-masculine images that dominated the pages of publications like Young Physique and Muscleboy, Bidgood photographed his nude to scantily clad models posed in lush, technicolor worlds of fantasy, creating beautiful images that erased the line between vulgar and sublime, erotica and art. As he had done in his photographs, Bidgood created the sets and costumes for PINK NARCISSUS in his cramped Manhattan apartment where, over 7 years, he shot most of the film’s flamboyant scenes on 8mm Kodachrome film stock. A few years into production, and with some modest financial backing, Bidgood was able to rent a larger space to shoot the final scenes of the film, with a larger cast, and on 16mm Ektachrome. Bobby Kendall, a teenage runaway hustler and one of Bidgood’s favorite models and sometimes roommate, was cast in the leading role and dominates most of the film with Bidgood’s camera lovingly following him about, lounging in his pink, jewel-encrusted boudoir and often caressing his own image in mirrors framed in gold. As Bidgood’s star daydreams about distant lands and times, the viewer is taken through a series of Bidgood’s opulent sets, each one more dazzling than the last, all the result of the filmmaker’s meticulous craft and opulent vision. Other hustlers, drag performers and friends make up the rest of the cast, including stage actor Charles Ludlam playing a number of roles in the film’s Times Square street scene. None of them have lines, not even Bobby. From beginning to end what is heard is a mesmerizing mélange of classical music, haunting sound effects, and a random switching from one radio station to another. Seven years into the project, a dispute with the financiers resulted in Bidgood taking his name off of the film’s credits and the film being completed without his participation. PINK NARCISSUS was released in 1971 with Bidgood’s credits for director, producer, writer, and photography listed as “Anonymous.” During the nearly ten years that PINK NARCISSUS was in production, the limitations on the public screening of sexually explicit films became less restricted, leading to the so-called Golden Age of Porn. Those changes are evident in the film as scenes introduce more sexual explicitness as they were filmed during the increasingly progressive decade. On Monday, May 24, 1971, PINK NARCISSUS premiered, screening at the Cinema Village and Cine Malibu theaters in New York City. The following day, The New York Times’ Vincent Canby slammed the film with a negative review, likening it to a “home- made Mardi Gras drag outfit.” Alternatively, Interview Magazine’s Labrunie Ducasse found PINK NARCISSUS “a golden dream, an unexpected L’AGE D’OR.” That summer PINK NARCISSUS continued playing in New York City into July, then screened in Boston, Memphis and San Francisco, where the gay weekly Bay Area Reporter’s Terry Alan Smith noted that the film “raises the level of homosexual erotica into the realm of art.” PINK NARCISSUS reached Los Angeles in January 1974. The 70s saw the first “boom” of LGBTQ+ cinema on screens big and small, as well as the launch of the first LGBTQ+ film festivals in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York. Though PINK NARCISSUS played in a small number of cities in the US after its release in 1971, it wasn’t until 1984 that the film was “rediscovered” by LGBT audiences, thanks to that year’s New York Gay Film Festival, where the film played to enthusiastic, sold- out audiences. From there, the film was screened at other LGBT film festivals and repertory film series across the country. Some circles in New York always knew that Bidgood was the “Anonymous” in the film credits, and as the film found new and receptive audiences in the 1980s, more and more, Bidgood was publicly credited as the film’s director. Despite the recognition, Bidgood still wanted nothing to do with a film he saw as not his own. But as the years passed, he began to acknowledge his role as the film’s visionary creator and appeared at a number of screenings to discuss his life and work, including PINK NARCISSUS, a film that would have a profound impact on queer culture, influencing artists ranging from Pierre et Gilles to David LaChapelle and Lil Nas X.Experimental, Fantasy, Erotica | USAPT1H5MNot Rated2025-06-06

Bobby Kendall

Don Brooks

Charles Ludlam

James Bidgood

Pink Narcissus (4K)"Pink Narcissus (4K)"

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