JURY GRAND PRIX - Image+Nation Film Festival | BEST DOCUMENTARY, BEST DIRECTOR, AUDIENCE AWARD - Long Beach LGBTQ | AUDIENCE AWARD BEST DOCUMENTARY - aGLIFF, Reeling Chicago, Tampa International, OUTfilm CT | BEST DOCUMENTARY - Out At The Movies
LGBTQ+ • Women • Female Solidarity • Entrepreneurship • Homophobia • Disability • Gender Spectrum • Celebrating LGBTQ+ identities
Date of Completion: 2020 | Run Time: 97 minutes | Language: English (Spanish, Italian, and Hebrew subtitles available) | Captions: Yes | Includes: Transcript & Study Guide | Director & Producer: Jen Rainin & Rivkah Beth Medow | Executive Producer: Lindsey Dryden | Edited by: Jessica Congdon | Score by: Meshell Ndegeocello
With a fist full of credit cards & a lucky run at the track, Franco Stevens launched Curve in the early ’90s, the best-selling lesbian magazine ever published. AHEAD OF THE CURVE is a must-see documentary for anyone hoping to understand LGBTQ+ women's history. Against the hostile backdrop of hate crimes and family rejection, with few celebrities or politicians willing to be out publicly, Curve magazine dared to show that lesbians, queer women, and non-binary people are fully human. Franco revisits Curve’s original mission, connecting with queer women leading today who share the belief that “true visibility looks like us being the authors of our own experience” and that “any type of visibility is radical, political.”
Yale School of Art | A.L. Steiner, Senior Critic
“The screening in our Introduction to Documentary Filmmaking at Yale was incredibly enriching and revealing of the extraordinary and innovative work behind Ahead of the Curve. The team’s dynamism and commitment to process, equitability and advocacy in storytelling and producing is unique – a model template for the future of doc filmmaking. "
School of Cinema, San Francisco State University | Johnny Symons, Associate Professor and Director of Queer Cinema Project
"Intersectionality and visibility, bringing lesbian history into the present and underscoring the importance of ongoing activism. The film has strong educational potential and will be a great tool in college classes focused on gender studies, history, journalism and community activism.”
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill | Dr. Ariana Vigil, Chair, Women’s and Gender Studies
"We held a very successful on-campus screening that attracted a group of interested and engaged students. Students loved having a cast member join for a Q&A and the event facilitated conversations that bridged academic interests with discussions about popular culture and queer media.”
Bonnie J. Morris, Ph.D.,author, Gender Studies professor | Georgetown University, George Washington University, and University of California, Berkeley
"The film is a great gift to a generation inheriting the sacrifice and risks undertaken by whip-smart 1990s dykes."
California State University Fresno | Lillian Faderman, Lesbian Historian; Professor Emerita of English at Fresno State
"Ahead of the Curve is a moving tribute to a hugely important time in lesbian history and the brave magazine and publisher that captured it all.”
Los Angeles Times | Tracy Brown
"As outlandish as the best urban legends. Ahead of the Curve celebrates lesbian triumph while trying to find new purpose in uncertain times".
Women in Higher Education | Lois Elfman
"It’s so rare that we are learning about queer women when we learn about queer history and culture. This film can make a more equitable experience about who is represented in those classes.”
BUST Magazine | Melody Heald
"A Must-See Documentary that people of all backgrounds will genuinely enjoy, especially those who are interested in learning about the intricacies and history of lesbian and queer media. This documentary is an eye opener, educating viewers on the struggles of LGBTQIA+ folks and their battles for acceptance and representation."
The Boston Globe | Peter Keough
"A vivid portrait of a resilient and inspiring figure as well as a microcosm of three decades of social and cultural change"
The Hollywood Reporter | Inkoo Kang
“ZIPPY INSIGHTFUL AND DEEPLY MOVING… First-time director Jen Rainin's portrait of Stevens, Curve's achievements and blindspots, lesbian progress during the Clinton era and the uneasiness with the "lesbian" label among many queer women today is accomplished, resonant and deeply moving.”
Little White Lies (magazine) | Laura Venning
"An unexpectedly insightful look at a piece of lesbian history. Exuberant... told with so much heart."
The Guardian | Peter Bradshaw
"A valuable portrait of a great risk-taker."
POV (Point of View Magazine) | Pat Mullen
"A page of queer history gets its due. An engaging portrait of the fight for visibility and the work that still needs to be done."
The Film Experience | Glenn Dunks
"Welcome levity and a smart fusion of history and biography...it is that youthful zest for queer rebellion (and an adult desire to recreate it) that carries AHEAD OF THE CURVE most of all”.
TIME Magazine | Lindsay Lee Wallace
"Ahead of the Curve Tells the Story of an Iconic Lesbian Magazine...where visibility coupled with connection can be alchemized into community."
AWARDS
Grand Prix | Frameline44
Best Documentary | Reeling
Audience Award Best Documentary | Long Beach Q Film Festival
Best Documentary, Best Director, Audience Award | Tampa International Film Festival
Audience Award Best Documentary | OUTfilm CT
Audience Award Best Documentary | Out At The Movies
Best Documentary | Milwaukee Film Festival
FILM FESTIVALS
Image+Nation
Bentonville Film Festival
aGLIFF
BendFilm Festival
Director for AHEAD OF THE CURVE
Jen Rainin’s personal mission is to use her experience in philanthropy, her credibility in the queer community, her filmmaking skills and her financial resources to build community and hope, eliminate shame, and inspire others through storytelling and film.
As CEO of the Kenneth Rainin Foundation since 2007, Jen works to enhance quality of life by championing the arts, promoting early childhood literacy and supporting research to cure chronic disease. She has developed major initiatives toward a world where all Oakland children read at or above grade level, no one suffers from Inflammatory Bowel Disease and Bay Area artists thrive.
Through Frankly Speaking Films, Jen and her creative partner make and support high quality films to address the deep need for representation of queer women’s stories. Their projects show powerful characters making positive changes in our world which complicate mainstream assumptions and lead to better questions, deeper empathy, and authentic connections.
With her wife, Jen co-founded The Curve Foundation, the only national nonprofit dedicated to championing lesbian, queer women, transgender, and nonbinary stories and culture. The organization supports journalists who tell our stories, produces speaker series to connect the community directly with our culture makers, and hosts intersectional intergenerational conversations on gender, queerness, race, ability, and activism.
Franco Stevens is the founder of Curve magazine, the most successful lesbian magazine in the world. Growing up, Franco never saw any representation of queer women – she didn’t even know it was possible for a woman to be gay. When she realized she was a lesbian, it changed the course of her life.
In 1990, Franco created a safe place for lesbians through the magazine, raising lesbian visibility in a way that connected the community, positioned the lesbian market for advertisers, helped the community accept femme-identifying lesbians, changed the way lesbians are seen by the mainstream, highlighted the transgender experience, brought attention to lesbian families, raised awareness of attacks on LGBTQ rights, and amplified the work of queer women activists. The magazine covered news, politics, entertainment, pop culture, style, and travel from a lesbian perspective, and helped build a foundation for many intersectional movements being led by today’s activists in the face of accelerating threats to the LGBTQ community.
In addition to being a pioneer in queer media, Franco has served on the board of directors for GLAAD, was a founding board member of the San Francisco LGBT Center, and co-founded The Curve Foundation, the only national nonprofit championing lesbian and queer women’s culture and stories through intergenerational programming and community building.