Harockerce What a beautiful movie!

Ameriatch One of the best films i have seen

Sharkflei Your blood may run cold, but you now find yourself pinioned to the story.

Philippa All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

bkoganbing Although we do get to hear the voice of Brandon Teena because of her taped interview with the police, The Brandon Teena Story is essentially the plot of Boys Don't Cry without the central protagonist. Hilary Swank filled the void that Brandon's absence created with her Academy Award winning performance. What we have here is a documentary of the events leading up to his murder and what happened to his killers.When dealing with a transgender individual to properly tell the story we have to go back to the cradle to those very first questioning that something is not right with the body I'm in. So it was with Tina Brandon born in Nebraska and raised in a time where she would have had limited access to literature about being transgender. She also was raised in a redneck culture and her male role models were the redneck boys she grew up with. This was to her what it meant to be a man.Before he was murdered at the end of 1993, Tina Brandon reversed her name and started living as Brandon Teena in a nearby town where no one knew him from a previous identity as a woman. As a man Brandon did pretty good with the woman by the accounts in the film and that aroused suspicion that eventually led to tragedy.There were two crimes involving Brandon Teena. The first was a brutal rape when her physical privacy was violated on Christmas Eve and then her murder along with two other people to silence them as witnesses after Brandon Teena brought the complaint of rape on New Year's Eve.Two things I guarantee you will disturb you for all time to come. The first was the total lack of remorse by Brandon's killers, John Lotter and Tom Nissen. They still truly believe that in their heart of hearts they were somehow defending the barriers of male sexuality from unwanted invasion. Secondly it's the total lack of compassion and understanding of transgender issues by the sheriff's department when you hear the sheriff questioning Brandon about the rape. Both these things sad to say aren't a new story for me. I worked 23 years for NYS Crime Victims Board and even today the approach some police take regarding gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgender crime victims is appalling. It's far worse where I live now in Buffalo than in New York City where I'm originally from. That it's not a new a revelatory story for me is another frightening thing.To get the facts as Joe Friday used to say on Dragnet, I suggest you watch the Brandon Teena Story documentary. To flesh out who was Brandon Teena than don't miss Hilary Swank's performance in Boys Don't Cry.This review is dedicated to all the Transgender support groups out there in the world, especially to the Buffalo Belles and Spectrum in my area. They provide an incalculable service to those transgender folks at various stages of their journey. Due to the insurance regulations most will die in the bodies they feel wrongly trapped in. Hopefully that will change and the Brandon Teenas don't have to stay Tina Brandon if that's not who they were meant to be.

Snarky This video holds nothing back, giving viewers actual footage of the town and neighborhoods where the victim and killers had once walked, drove and partied in. It also takes you up the country road to the talked about farmhouse where three people were murdered in the dead of winter night. There are actual crime scene photos of Teena Brandon and the inside of the broken-into farmhouse. I found those particularly disturbing, but I guess that is how to try capturing the essence of what it was like so viewers may learn from it. The video also includes interviews from friends and family of the killers and the victims. There are even interviews from inside the prisons from the killers themselves, trying to appear wrongly accused and failing miserably. The clueless sheriff is also seen praising their law enforcement, even after botching the rape and murder case in front of the world. This is not for children or the squeamish, and it really makes a strong impact.

caitlinc-1 I just wanted to acknowledge the fact that if we are going to talk about how people are closed- minded and how society's views must be altered to include transgendered individuals as people of value and importance in our culture, then we must first begin with the little things: If Brandon felt that he identified as a male then we should give him the respect he deserves as someone who served as a lesson for us all. This means referring to him as male. If Brandon saw himself as male then we should refer to him accordingly. I suggest that whoever designed this IMDb movie profile should re-evaluate the way this profile is set up and change the cast description to Brandon Teena...himself (not herself). This is the first step to achieving what I'm sure Brandon would have wanted: to have transgendered people be accepted as how they see themselves- not how someone else sees them.

dwpollar 1st watched 1/7/2001 - 7 out of 10(Dir-Susan Muska & Greta Olafsdottir): Well-done documentary about a women/girl who posed as a man/boy convincingly and then was later raped and killed by those who had a problem with her doing this. This is the type of movie that makes you question your beliefs and whose side your on or whether you should even be on any side. The complexity starts with the fact that Brandon is really Teena but she was born with both sex organs and was a confused kid, then our prejudicial part of the society shows through any many areas. Other than some bad choices of background music a good documentary.