Up a narrow staircase in SF’s Castro district, past a door you’d walk right by, there’s a shop called AutoErotica that looks like a vintage smut store and is actually one of the most important queer archives in North America.
Owner Patrick Batt has spent decades collecting the magazines, films, records, and general beautiful filth that taught generations of gay men how to find each other back when finding each other could cost you everything. This short doc spends time with Patrick and the people who treat his cluttered little kingdom like a library. Remember: Somebody’s estate sale castoffs are somebody else’s origin story!
The film premiered at Frameline and has since racked up screenings at more than 20 festivals across the US, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, plus a pile of jury prizes and audience awards. The team is now building it out into a feature called A Very Oral History, tracing how queer culture got made, passed around, and kept alive through porn mags and mixtapes and photographs stuffed in shoeboxes. Watch the short above, then go hug your local archivist!
We’ve picked up some great magazines and things from here. Check out the site for yourself!
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