Chicken Hawk: Men Who Love Boys (film)

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Chicken Hawk: Men Who Love Boys (film)

Year Released: 1994
MPAA Rating (USA): NR
Director: Adi Sideman
Starring: Leyland Stevenson
Renatto Corazzo
Peter Melzer
Chuck Dodson


Chicken Hawk: Men Who Love Boys is a 1994 award winning documentary produced, written and directed by Adi Sideman. The term, "chicken hawk," is a label used derogatory in gay slang to refer to an older man who pursue relationships with younger men and teenagers.[1] The film was seemingly edited to negatively sensationalize the topic and is similar in tone and accuracy to the 1936 George Hirliman film "Reefer Madness". TV Guide states that: "While Sideman has done a good job ferreting out raw material, his organizational skills leave much to be desired. As characters flash by unidentified, time and place are allowed to blur, and CHICKENHAWK emerges as a cluttered, often perplexing, affair."[2] In an interview entitled, "The filmmaker who looked at pederasty without flinching"[3] Adi Sideman expresses his pride that the film is used by law enforcement to profile minor attracted people for pedophile hunters in the FBI. He stated, " I let the men in the film hang themselves".

The narrator interviews several members of North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) who discuss their views on sexual relationships between men and boys. Scenes in the movie include following 4 outspoken NAMBLA members: Leyland Stevenson, Renatto Corazzo, Peter Melzer and Chuck Dodson. The film describes the organization and its history. Scenes in the movie include a group of NAMBLA members participating in the 1993 March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation. NAMBLA members argue for NAMBLA's inclusion in the gay rights movement, to the disapproval of other attendees. Poet and free speech advocate Allen Ginsberg, NAMBLA's most famous member and defender, appeared in the documentary and read a "graphic ode to youth".[4]

Joey O'Bryan summed up the film for the Austin Chronicle as follows:

"In the end, Chicken Hawk is unmercifully fair, as neither side holds much credibility. The NAMBLA members come off looking like a deluded bunch of perverts, while the conservative forces opposing them offer up an image of bullying, foul-mouthed rednecks hurling unspeakably homophobic playground vulgarities at pathetically easy targets. It is precisely this balance that makes the film so fascinating, not to mention somewhat frustrating, for Sideman's camera merely records and documents facts, events, and opinions, rather than interpret them." [5]


References

  1. chicken hawk (Merriam-Webster Dictionary)
  2. TV Guide Review: Chicken Hawk: Men Who Love Boys
  3. The filmmaker who looked at pederasty without flinching.
  4. Jacobs, Andrea. "Allen Ginsberg's advocacy of pedophilia debated in community", Intermountain Jewish News, 2002-06-21. Retrieved on 2010-09-17. 
  5. Review in The Austin Chronicle

External links