Orlando, My Political Biography
Virginia Woolf wrote Orlando in 1928, the first novel in which the hero, who becomes a heroine, lives through five centuries (1588-1928) and changes gender in the middle of the story. A century later, researcher, curator, author, and transgender activist Paul B. Preciado decided to send a filmed letter to Virginia Woolf: his Orlando had stepped out of her fiction and was living a life she could never have imagined. Preciado organized a casting call and brought together 26 contemporary trans and non-binary people, aged 8 to 70, to embody Orlando...
| Director | Paul B. Preciado |
| Actor | Sofia Bohdanowicz |
| Share on |
"Paul B. Preciado’s Orlando, My Political Biography is a luminous reimagining of Virginia Woolf’s 1928 novel, brought into the present through the voices, auras, and bodies of 26 trans and non-binary individuals between the ages of 8 and 70. Preciado, who has long claimed Woolf’s text as their own biography, inverts the gesture by inviting others to embody Orlando, introducing themselves as Woolf’s protagonist while recounting intimate details of childhood, names, desires, and moments of injustice.
Shot with a lush, pop-video vibrancy yet rooted in documentary candor, the film oscillates between playful stagings, interviews, chorus-like testimonies, and readings from Woolf’s book. Costumes shimmer with modern medieval imagination; we visit hotel lobbies or psychiatrist offices; while dreamlike sequences of sleeping Orlando’s suggest transition as a tender, magical act. Preciado complicates Woolf’s aristocratic transformation by underscoring that trans identity is not confined to fiction but expressed brightly through politics, poetry, and survival. The result is both casual and cunningly precise. I see it as a triumphant collective portrait that remakes literary history and radiates the joyful energy of lives defiantly lived."
Sofia Bohdanowicz
Filmmaker
-
Français
1h38
Language: Français
Subtitles: Français
- Année 2023
- Pays France
- Durée 98
- Producteur Les Films du Poisson, 24images
- Langue French, English, Spanish
- Sous-titres French
- Résumé court Paul B. Preciado brings together 26 trans and non-binary people to embody Orlando, Virginia Woolf's character who changes gender during the course of the story.
- Mention festival Encounters Special Jury Award and Teddy Award · Berlinale 2023
- Ordre 1
"Paul B. Preciado’s Orlando, My Political Biography is a luminous reimagining of Virginia Woolf’s 1928 novel, brought into the present through the voices, auras, and bodies of 26 trans and non-binary individuals between the ages of 8 and 70. Preciado, who has long claimed Woolf’s text as their own biography, inverts the gesture by inviting others to embody Orlando, introducing themselves as Woolf’s protagonist while recounting intimate details of childhood, names, desires, and moments of injustice.
Shot with a lush, pop-video vibrancy yet rooted in documentary candor, the film oscillates between playful stagings, interviews, chorus-like testimonies, and readings from Woolf’s book. Costumes shimmer with modern medieval imagination; we visit hotel lobbies or psychiatrist offices; while dreamlike sequences of sleeping Orlando’s suggest transition as a tender, magical act. Preciado complicates Woolf’s aristocratic transformation by underscoring that trans identity is not confined to fiction but expressed brightly through politics, poetry, and survival. The result is both casual and cunningly precise. I see it as a triumphant collective portrait that remakes literary history and radiates the joyful energy of lives defiantly lived."
Sofia Bohdanowicz
Filmmaker
-
Français
Duration: 1h38Language: Français
Subtitles: Français1h38
- Année 2023
- Pays France
- Durée 98
- Producteur Les Films du Poisson, 24images
- Langue French, English, Spanish
- Sous-titres French
- Résumé court Paul B. Preciado brings together 26 trans and non-binary people to embody Orlando, Virginia Woolf's character who changes gender during the course of the story.
- Mention festival Encounters Special Jury Award and Teddy Award · Berlinale 2023
- Ordre 1
