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Film: Documentary Screaming Queens (2005)

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For the transgendered women, drag queens, and gay prostitutes who regularly congregated at the San Francisco all-night diner Compton's Cafeteria in the '60s, police raids and violent harassment were a part of everyday life. But in 1966 — a full three years before the infamous Stonewall riots would make headlines across the nation — this marginalized community forcibly resisted police oppression in a window-smashing, furniture-throwing, newsstand-burning melée. Using archival footage, interviews, and dramatic reenactments, Screaming Queens shows how this largely forgotten struggle prompted a dialogue with Bay Area police departments, eased social and political tensions in the city, and helped kickstart the nascent LGBT movement.

– Suzanne Niemoth