Fantasia 2017, Day 18, Part 1: Geek Girls
Sunday, July 30, was going to be a big day. I had four movies I hoped to see, some of them scheduled so tightly I wasn’t sure I could get to all of them in time despite the convenient proximity of the Fantasia theatres one to another. Still, I at least knew I’d start my day in the D.B. Clarke Theatre, where I would see Geek Girls, a documentary by Gina Hara.
The film’s narrated by Hara herself, a Montrealer of Hungarian birth. We see her reflecting in voiceover on her status as a self-identified geek, and hear interviews with a number of women in geekish fields who talk about their lives and their experiences as women in geek spaces and geek communities. The interviews aren’t presented as give-and-take conversations, Hara instead absenting herself from the film and allowing her interviewees’ words to shape the piece. We hear from a scientist, a game designer, from cosplayers and bloggers and manga makers, from gamers professional and otherwise. Hara’s film becomes about her own search for a place, and for an understanding of what it means to be a geek. We’re told that there’s no word for “geek” in Hungarian, but even in North America, what does it mean for her as a woman to be a geek?
Hara avoids any journalistic reliance on facts and figures, making her film much more of a personal memoir. This is a series of discussions and reflections, not infodumps; even Hara’s interviewees are each introduced, cleverly, with the camera showing a physical sign with their name on it rather than by using subtitles. The interviews are edited so that the film progresses through a rough series of themes, examining the issues of women in geek-related fields. Overall the focus here is on the sense of community among women (especially); that is, the film’s more about the value of fandom rather than an investigation of what pulls one in to being a fan.
