Ruminations follows the life of a reclusive drag icon known as Rumi Missabu. As a founding member of the radical queer performance group, The Cockettes, Rumi leaves Hollywood a child actor and dives headfirst into the LSD fueled hippie culture of San Francisco. This lifestyle leads to Rumi burning out and disappearing off the grid for decades. It isn’t until the mid 90’s that Rumi finally regains his identity and reemerges on the stage with a new art form. However, Rumi’s health plummets and he is presented with a newfound sense of urgency to leave behind a meaningful legacy.
A film by Robert James
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Director Bio
Robert James started his cinematic career in 2009 by attending film classes at City College San Francisco in his late 40’s. After interning with documentary filmmaker Ondi Timoner and working on her projects, the two co-directed the short film Library of Dust in 2011, garnering many awards. This led to a 7-year journey shooting a story about sex and religion; evolving into a forthcoming documentary series that Robert is pursuing with collaborators. During these years Robert also completed his first documentary feature film RUMINATIONS about a drag hippie icon and a short doc called VERASPHERE: A Love Story in Costume about a performance troupe started by two long-terms AIDS survivors.