Lola und Bilidikid

Summary

Lola and Billy the Kid

A troupe of Turkish drag queens calling themselves "The Migrant Workers" performs to great acclaim at an off-off club in Berlin's Kreuzberg district. One of their number, Lola, considers herself a gay man. He is stepping out with macho man Billy, who is pressing Lola to get a sex-change operation so he can go back to Turkey and open a beach bar with a woman at his side. Lola's brother Murat, who still lives with their mother, is also gay. Like Lola before him, Murat's sexuality is not accepted by their older brother Osman. And just like Lola, Murat is mercilessly bullied by a trio of German neo-Nazis. When Lola washes up dead in the River Spree, it is clear to Billy that the three murdered her. He takes Murat under his wing and turns him into an avenging angel – "this is our war, yours and mine". But is Billy right?

This intense family drama by UCLA graduate Kutluğ Ataman juxtaposes its cross-cultural characters with homophobic attitudes in the Turkish district of Berlin Kreuzberg, as well the bourgeois suburb of Wannsee. By doing so, it takes us into a queer subculture whose members, being both gay and Turkish, are subject to double discrimination.

Source: 76. Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin (Catalogue)