Pick a queer woman out of a line-up and ask her favorite movie, and there’s a good chance she’ll respond with this masterpiece by Lilly and Lana Wachowski. Maybe it’s the ease with which Jennifer Tilly’s Violet seduces anything with a pulse, maybe it’s the butch swagger with which Gina Gershon’s Corky carries herself (and the rest of the us), or maybe it’s the breathtakingly hot sex scene the two of them share — hell, maybe it’s Joey Pantoliano’s fearful charisma, we won’t hold it against you — whatever the reason, they’re all correct. 

Thirty years after an historic Castro Theatre screening at Frameline20, this remarkable debut feature continues to inspire for its dazzling neo-noir visuals, and its sensual exploration of lesbian love and sex, and its expertly-plotted story. Set almost entirely in a Chicago apartment building, the film follows Corky and Violet as they plan to run away and build a new life for themselves by stealing from Violet’s money-laundering boyfriend Caesar and the mob he works for. Whether you’re seeing it for the first time or the fifteenth, Bound will have you biting your lip with pleasure, because it, like all of the greatest sapphic delights, somehow manages to get better (and hotter) with age.