Coming to VOD today, Tuesday, June 9: GTFO THE MOVIE
Shannon Sun-Higginson’s investigation of hostility against women in the gaming world had its world premiere at SXSW earlier this year. It has since screened at DOXA, IFF Boston, Global Visions, and SF DocFest. FilmBuff now releases the doc on iTunes and Vimeo on Demand.
Last Summer’s Gamergate exposed rampant misogyny within some elements of the gamer community. While Sun-Higginson’s film is not focused on the particulars of that controversy, addressing it only as a postscript, she assembles more than enough damning testimony that speaks to the challenges faced by women in gaming, a player population that has been on the rise. As the film relates, at its most (relatively) benign, gaming culture historically and consistently has set up barriers to entrance to females, and displays a lack of diversity and representation within its design and play that caters nearly exclusively to males. At its most extreme, gaming has proven outright hostile at times, escalating a “boys club” sentiment that moves from condescension to harassment to even threats of physical violence against women who are encroaching on their territory. In addition to revisiting notorious examples of such hostility, Sun-Higginson surveys a range of women about their individual experiences. While the topic is engaging, essential, and rife with potential, the execution is sadly wanting – talking heads dominate and are repetitive, production values vary and are often rough, and music is overused and distracting. The film does make some good use of 8-bit graphics and titles, but much more could have been done to make this more visually arresting.
what (not) to doc 