GEMMEL & TIM

WORLD PREMIERE

Gemmel & Tim plays together with the film Crystal Diaries.

In two urgent and timely films, the deaths of Gemmel Moore and Timothy Michael Dean at the West Hollywood home of businessman and political donor Ed Buck are memorialized from two differing but complementary vantage points. Buck, who stands trial this year for his crimes, habitually lured gay, Black men to his home, injecting them with high doses of methamphetamine, which proved fatal for Gemmel and Tim.

Enyce Smith & Gina Lamb’s Crystal Diaries operates from within the Los Angeles LGBTQ+ House & Ball Community, where co-director Smith’s friendship with Gemmel Moore developed. Raw and immediate, the film charts the support network that emerged among this close-knit community following Gemmel’s death, dedicated to aiding members struggling with addiction. What results is a stirring portrait of a community banding together to heal, create awareness, and protest the justice system’s slow response to Moore’s death.

Michiel Thomas’s Gemmel & Tim, through meticulous research and a skillful journalistic approach, charts the progression of Buck’s crimes through the years, encompassing former District Attorney Jackie Lacey’s initial decision not to prosecute, tireless efforts to keep the story in the news, and the effects of the deaths on personal friends of both men. This incisive storytelling builds to a clear call for justice in the face of Buck’s imminent 2021 trial.

Together, these films emphasize the need for our community to listen to and support marginalized voices, and spark an urgently needed discussion about issues affecting our LGBTQIA+ family right here in our own neighborhoods.