Myth of Father

Filmmaker Paul Hill admits he “freaked out” when his dad took him to a crowded Irish pub and confessed he was a woman trapped inside a man's body, but since that revelation, his transsexual father's newfound identity as Jodie, coupled with Paul's fascination with the possibilities of a rekindled paternal relationship, has brought them closer together. Now, Paul wants to pull off a family reunion with various (and in some instances, estranged) Hill family members so they can get to know Jodie better. Although his grandmother and mother, now remarried, refuse to attend the reunion (or to be interviewed for the film, for that matter), Paul manages some brief but insightful interviews with his stepmother, as well as his father's brother and half-brother. What's so satisfying about Myth of Father is Paul's lighthearted acceptance of the cultural jolt of his father's revised sexual identity, as well as the dry wit with which he limns the responses of other family members (including the eye-rolling relatives who are trying to reconcile Jodie's past life of guitars, girls, and fast cars with her new life). But in less than thirty minutes, Paul's family (and viewers) learns quite a bit about the frank and funny Jodie: her troubled relationship with her father (“I was a miserable son of a bitch”); her regrets for what she's put her family through; and her considerable fears over whether to undergo a formal sex change operation. An unflinching but never grim take on transgender issues from a son's perspective, this is a much sunnier complement to the similarly-themed but brutally painful A Boy Named Sue (VL-1/02). Aud: C, P. (A. Cantú)