FLAG WARS

AWARDS

Best Documentary, Grand Jury Award
SXSW Film Festival, March 2003

Filmmaker Award, Center for Documentary Studies
Full Frame Documentary Film Festival, April 2003

Honorary Mention, Best Documentary
Nashville Film Festival, May 2003

Centerpiece Program
OUTFEST 2003: Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Film Festival

Critical Acclaim

“The film is fascinating
point-of-view storytelling.”
- Elvis Mitchell
The New York Times, March 15, 2003

“. . . disturbing and provocative . . .”
- Kevin Thomas
Los Angeles Times, June 19, 2003

“Fly-on-the-wall ‘Flag Wars’ chronicles the gay gentrification of a mostly black, working-class Cleveland neighborhood; the tape becomes a fascinating case study in market forces and culture clash.”
- Ed Halter
Village Voice, June 4, 2003

“ ‘Flag Wars,’ the extraordinarily moving documentary by Linda Goode Bryant and Laura Poitras, tells the story of an increasingly common but little-documented American phenomenon — the economic and ideological clashes involved in urban gay gentrification . . . Featuring an immediate vérité style, unforgettable subjects, and a hauntingly elegiac jazz score by Graham Haynes, the film is as deeply moving as it is politically astute.”
- The Advocate, June 17, 2003

"… a riveting study of the conflicts that emerge when white gays and lesbians begin gentrifying a black working-class neighborhood in Columbus, Ohio. With its vivid characters and polarizing conflicts, "Flag Wars" was a popular and critical hit…”
- David Fellerath
IndieWire, April 24t, 2003

“That a film about real estate could be this fascinating and blood-boiling is just one of the many wonders in the absorbing documentary ‘Flag Wars.’ . . . Filmmakers Linda Goode Bryant and Laura Poitras have hit upon a powder keg subject that will be close to many Atlantans' hearts. . . . ‘Flag Wars’ is a stodgy title for a film full of invective, outrage and genuine cruelty that provokes questions about how much damage gentrification and designations like ‘historic district’ can do in displacing the original occupants of a neighborhood.”
- Felicia Feaster
Creative Loafing, Atlanta, June 5, 2003