AUDIO

Limited Partnership

color & b/w. 74 min. , dist. by Cinema Guild, www.cinemaguild.com. 2015. DVD ISBN 9780781515139. $99.95; acad. libs. $395 (Rental: $125). Public performance. SOC SCI/GENDER STUDIES
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In 1975, Filipino American Richard Adams and his Australian partner Tony Sullivan applied for a marriage license in Boulder, CO. Incredibly, the license was granted, making them one of the first same-sex couples in the country (and probably the world) to be legally married. But beyond the forward-thinking Boulder county clerk who signed their license, few were willing to honor the couple's married status. This included the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), which jaw-droppingly responded to Sullivan's request for a visa by referring to the couple, in a letter, as "faggots." Limited Partnership traces the men's long struggle to gain citizenship for Sullivan in the context of the larger history of the marriage equality movement in the United States. Interviews are interspersed with television coverage of historic milestones, court rulings, and changes in the public's attitudes toward LGBT issues. A helpful time line at the bottom of the screen lets viewers know exactly where they are chronologically.
VERDICT A moving film that personalizes the decades-long fight for marriage equality while providing solid historical background on how it was finally achieved. The film was released prior to the Supreme Court's historic 2015 Obergefell v. Hodges ruling that would definitively grant same-sex couples full marriage equality. Recommended for classroom use and for school and academic library collections.
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