Macho Dancer centres on Paul, who leaves his impoverished rural village to work as a dancer, stripper, and rent boy in Manila’s red light district. While the film depicts sexual exploitation with shocking frankness, it nonetheless finds some hope in the genuine camaraderie that develops between the performers offstage. Due to its hard content and uncompromising social critique, the film was heavily cut in the Philippines, leading Brocka to smuggle out an uncensored copy to international film festivals.

Revisited after nearly four decades, the strikingly erotic imagery on display in Macho Dancer forces us to consider our desires, and complicity, as viewers.

With introduction by Vee Dagger. Screening as part of Queer East on Tour.

Vee Dagger is a Taiwanese drag performer / DJ / film curator based in Leeds. Her work centres around the gothic and the melodramatic with a special interest in the gruesome. She has worked with Queer East, Transform Leeds, Leeds Art Gallery, Opera North and assorted others. Please talk to her about vampires.