“Christopher LaMarca and Jessica Dimmock’s The Pearl is a nighttime movie,” wrote Vadim Rizov out of True False in 2016, “all quiet, warmly illuminated interior spaces populated by a self-supporting community.” That community is one of older trans women living in the Pacific Northwest and coming out for the first time in their fifties and sixies, and LaMarca and Dimmock’s is indeed a beautifully shot and empathetic portrait. The film was selected for our 2016 “Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You” program, when we wrote:

Dimmock and LaMarca’s debut feature documentary is an intimate portrait of a group of trans women supporting and sustaining each other while occasionally arguing over generational and political fault lines. Some, like Nina, realized their sexual identity only in middle age; others are younger and ready to articulate their ideological and personal position in the world. The Pearl observes but never judges, creating a safe space via careful—but never over-aestheticized—camerawork that belies the directors’ shared background as photographers.

Both Dimmock and LaMarca made our 25 New Faces list in 2014, and The Pearl is a powerful work that is receiving its iTunes premiere on February 6. The Pearl can be preordered now.