** After-party at Queer Bar after the Mar. 2 7:30 screening! **

At The Great Passion Play in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, LGBTQ audiences watch a production of the last week of Jesus Christ in a grand amphitheater. Inside the nearby Eureka Live Underground club, the “hillbilly Studio 54,” drag queens sing songs of worship. All the while, a 65-foot high sculpture of Jesus Christ casts a benevolent shadow.

The complexity of this tiny community nestled in the Ozark Mountains is traced with a delicate touch by directors Michael Palmieri and Donal Mosher. They use the co-habitation of these seemingly disparate lifestyles as an opportunity not to draw distinctions between people, but to revel in the dazzling plumage of humanity. Buttressed by empathetic interviews and boisterous scenes of pageantry, the the two filmmakers and the citizens of Eureka Springs fabulously smash stereotypes and challenge cliché assumptions. Together they have created a film—and a city—built on love, faith, and good ol’ fashioned American showmanship. Narrated by Mx Justin Vivian Bond.

Description by Andy Stark. All images on this page courtesy of Kino Lorber.

Fun trivia: The Gospel of Eureka is narrated by Justin Vivian Bond, who is a tour alumnus of the Sister Spit spoken word tour, the 2019 edition of which will come to NWFF on Mar. 2 alongside Eureka!

“A miracle indeed… It’s a comedy and a tragedy, though the people involved aren’t necessarily on rigid opposite sides. Better to say that everyone has some level of fluidity, not just in terms of personal belief, though they’ll speak their dogmatic minds if the occasion demands it.” — Keith Uhlich, The Hollywood Reporter

“One of the more fascinating examinations of American religion and the meaning of faith in recent cinema.” – Nathanael Hood, Unseen Films