12:19pm | The Long Beach QFilm Festival celebrates its 18th year with a new set of features, documentaries, and short films that, according to the organizers, “embody the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer community.” The festival is taking place at the historic Art Theater, ensconced in the heart of 4th Street’s Retro Row. Screenings start on Friday and continue through Sunday.
On Saturday at 12:30, Charlie Gage will present ‘Inspired: The Voices Against Prop 8,’ a documentary film that arose from his involvement in protests that followed in the wake of the 2008 election. I asked Gage what his thoughts were about the proposition prior to the election.
Charlie: To be honest, I was much like many of the film’s subjects. I didn’t much think about it. I kind of just assumed it wouldn’t pass because this is “liberal California.” I never did any political activism, and the closest thing to gay activism I had done was walking in the AIDS Walk.
Sander: When did you begin to recognize that the outcome might have the makings of a story?
Charlie: I don’t think I ever thought about it in those terms, specifically about the outcome of the vote. I remember being shocked when it happened, but it was the impromptu protest in West Hollywood on the night after that made me think that the reaction from the gay community was something historic.
I attended the protest only because my friend wanted to go, I had no desire whatsoever to be there. I actually thought the idea of a protest in the heart of West Hollywood was lame but, once the crowd broke off and ran onto Sunset Blvd in full traffic, stopping cars, I thought, “yes, this is what we need to do to let people know this does matter.”
To be honest, I never planned on making a film, and I didn’t think about making a film for months down the road. I just brought a cheap little camera to film stuff as my own way of documenting it, with no thought of what I would ever do with the footage.
Sander: So how did you go from raw documentation to the notion of using it?
Charlie: Like many people at the time, I became somewhat addicted to the protests. I went to every one I could. One Sunday I went to four different rallies, running from here in Long Beach to Pasadena, and back. One day I slowed down and actually realized how much footage I had, and that’s when I started talking to my best friend, Ian McIntosh, about what to do with it. We decided to join up and make a film.
So around February of 2009, when the rallies had somewhat died down, we started to find people to interview. It was a bit like stalking. We looked through footage from all the rallies. We looked for the people who appeared to take center stage, then did some facebook stalking. Once the ball started rolling these people would say, “Oh! You really need to talk too so and so.” Through the interviews, and our footage, the storyline was born.
Documentaries are kinda weird, as you don’t really have a storyboard or a script, just an idea that you sort of test out and see where it takes you. You also always find things you never expected.
Sander: What were some of the surprises?
Charlie: Our original concept was much more simple and, now that I look back, boring. [laughs] It was just people who never protested before that now went to bunch of marches, and how they felt. There were actually about 7 people that never made the film because they were from that old concept. Still, we ended up meeting people who started all these grass roots groups, and realized this was the story.
The big surprise was that within these newly formed grass roots LGBTQ activist groups there were large divides, and the largest divide was a rift between the groups that sprouted in West LA/WeHo (mainly white higher income) and the groups from East LA (mostly Latino & lower income).
Sander: What was the big difference? 
Charlie: Honestly, it seemed like it was simple lack of knowledge of each others’ areas and backgrounds. I experienced a lot of West Side people saying things like “this is the first time I’ve ever felt discriminated against,” and East Side people responding, “welcome to my world.” Plus, there was this general notion that the East Side was more ‘radical,’ and wanted to do more civil disobedience which, in reality, wasn’t very true, but more of an assumption based on racial stereotypes. As one of the cast members says in the film, “Just because we’re born gay doesn’t mean we’re not racist.”
I must say this, though: The whole reason behind this coming out was because, at the time of the interviews, most of the big protests had died down and the California Supreme Court had taken up Prop 8 to rule if it was constitutional. All these newly formed groups felt like they needed to be ready to respond when the ruling came down, but there was a weird 3 month window when the ruling could come.
At the time there were about 30 newly formed groups. Each group represented its own niche. They realized they need to work together to plan a unified response for what was dubbed the “day of decision,” but it was in the the D-day planing that these conflicts came out.
INSPIRED runs from the election day to the day of decision in May of 2009, and is focused mainly on the greater Los Angeles area.
Sander: The QFilm Festival is the California premiere, but the film was shown at QDOC in Portland, OR a few months ago. How was it received there?
Charlie: Unfortunately, I was told it was the first weekend in 3 months that it didn’t rain in Portland, so most people didn’t want to be in a theater. The turn-out wasn’t huge, but the people came really did like the film. We got some good press in the Portland area.
I could tell that the people who showed up to the movie were hungry for information. I was asked several questions in the Q&A, and only one was about the film. The rest were about the current status of the movement, and the politics. I realized these people really hadn’t had anyone to ask these questions to before. I ended up in the position of speaking on behalf of the many groups that arose after the vote.
Sander: Did you feel comfortable in that role?
Charlie: Luckily, the night before I left for Portland I went to a town hall meeting in East LA put on by the Latino Equality Alliance (LEA) and EQCA dealing with the current situation, and debating the whole 2012 thing, so I knew just enough to get by. [laughs]
Sander: What has happened with the film since that first screening in June?
Charlie: We’ve mostly been submitting to film festivals. At this point we have been accepted to the Long Beach QFilm Festival and, exactly 1 week after that, we are screening in Miami at the Miami International Documentary Film Festival, which is very important because it is not specifically a gay festival.
Sander: So, here we are, just a few days away from your screening, and also poised for another historic ruling by the State Supreme Court. How do you feel?
Charlie: Nervous and excited. This showing really is a homecoming for me but, as for the ruling, Tim Lykowski, our executive producer and also co-producer Ian McIntosh’s husband, is a lawyer. I was concerned that our film was going to come out when this ruling happened. He sat me down saying that, while the oral arguments were taking place and regardless of what way the courts rule, this is far from legally over, which is sad. Still, I am glad that at least it is another step, hopefully forward, oddly a step forward to the way things were in the past, which is a bit ironic, I guess.
The screening in Miami is equally big because we really want to make it our goal to get this film out to many types of venues and film festivals, not just gay ones. That would be no different than a rally in the middle of West Hollywood to a gay audience.
I hope that people in LA get over their idea that Long Beach is a 4 hour drive away, and they actually come down to see it! [laughs]
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Buy tickets, and learn more about the QFilm Festival, at QFilmsLongBeach.com.
View trailers and clips of the film at InspiredBy8.com.
Procedes from the festival benefit The Center Long Beach.
Follow the cases currently in the California State Supreme Court.