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Torino GLBT Film Festival 2009: Documentary / Short Film Lineup

Torino GLBT Film Festival 2009: Documentary / Short Film Lineup
Documentaries IN COMPETITION
Boriven nee yu pai tai karn kuk kun (This Area is Under Quarantine) by Thunska Pansittivorakul (Thailand, 2009)
friday 24 april, 16.45 – monday 27 april, 11.30
Out in India: A Family’s Journey by Tom Keegan (USA/India, 2007)
friday 24 april, 18.30 – saturday 25 april, 11.30

Intimidades de Shakespeare y Victor Hugo (Shakespeare and Victor Hugo’s Intimacies) by Yulene Olaizola (Mexico, 2008)
friday 24 april, 15.30 (Sala 3) – saturday 25 april, 11.30 (Sala 3)
Giorgio/Giorgia… storia di una voce (Giorgio/Giorgia…History of a Voice) by Gianfranco Mingozzi (Italy, 2008)
saturday [...]

Torino GLBT Film Festival 2009: Feature Lineup

Torino GLBT Film Festival 2009: Feature Lineup
Feature Films IN COMPETITION

Rückenwind (Light Gradient) by Jan Krüger (Germany, 2009)
friday 24 april, 18.30 – saturday 25 april, 14.30

El patio de mi cárcel (My Prison Yard) by Belén Macías (Spain, 2008)
friday 24 april, 22.45 – saturday 25 april, 11.30

Gu huo (Fire in Silence) by Shen Weiwei (China, 2008)
saturday 25 april, 18 – sunday 26 april, 14.15

Leonera (Lion’s Den) by Pablo Trapero (Argentina/South Korea/Brazil, 2008)
saturday 25 april, 20 – monday 27 april, 11

Selda (The Inmate) by Ellen Ramos, Paolo Villaluna (Philippines, 2008)
saturday 25 [...]

John Greyson Boycotts 2009 Tel Aviv LGBT Film Festival

In Haaretz.com, Cnaan Liphshiz discusses the reactions to Toronto-based filmmaker John Greyson’s refusal to attend the 2009 Tel Aviv International LGBT film festival, which runs June 23-27. Below are a couple of brief quotes from Liphshiz’s piece:
"’What Greyson has done is an act of violence both against Israeli gays as well as [gay] Palestinians, for whom this festival is a rare ray of light,’ said Yair Hochner, the festival’s Israeli-born organizer and an internationally-acclaimed director. Greyson told Anglo File this week: ‘With ongoing violations by Israel of Palestinian human rights and given the specific content of my film, screening it in Israel would be hypocrisy.’ The film, Fig Trees, deals with [...]

Torino GLBT Film Festival 2009: Q&A with Festival Director Giovanni Minerba

 
Giovanni Minerba (above), director of the Torino GLBT Film Festival, and his staff have been busy selecting entries for the 24th edition of Turin’s annual gay & lesbian film event, which will take place April 23-30.
In addition to competition and out-of-competition screenings, the festival will feature homages, retrospectives, and assorted sidebars, including a tribute to Spanish director Ventura Pons, best known internationally for the touching Food of Love; a screening of the films of author-filmmaker Giuseppe Patroni Griffi, whose best-known directorial effort is probably ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore; and a sidebar featuring several entries handpicked by filmmaker Ferzan Ozpetek and another showcasing campy sword-and-sandal epics of the early ’60s.
Festival director Minerba has kindly agreed to answer [...]

Cheryl Dunye’s THE WATERMELON WOMAN at the REDCAT

Actress-filmmaker Cheryl Dunye and producer Alexandra Juhasz will be present at the REDCAT in downtown Los Angeles for a screening of Dunye’s 1996 feature The Watermelon Woman on Monday, May 11, at 8:30 pm. The film will be screened in Beta SP. A fundraiser for the restoration of The Watermelon Woman will be held earlier that day (6:00-7:30 pm) at the Phyllis Stein Art, also in downtown LA. (More information below.)
Called both a “saucy, daring, insidiously smart debut” (The Boston Phoenix) and "flotsam floating down a sewer" (Christian right-winger Jesse Helms) The Watermelon Woman is, according to the REDCAT press release, "the first-ever theatrical feature directed by an African American [actually born in Liberia] lesbian." The film [...]

THE CELLULOID CLOSET, VICTOR/VICTORIA in Chicago

Via David Hudson’s The Daily, who got it via Ed M. Koziarski’s brief piece in The Chicago Reader:
Queer Cinema 101 is a five-week film series showcasing gay-themed films picked by gay film critics. The weekly series kicks off Monday, April 13 at Chicago’s GLBT Center on Halsted and continues through Monday, May 11.
The five films are:

The Celluloid Closet (1995, above, k.d. lang sings "Secret Love"), hosted by Richard Knight Jr., Cinema Writer, Windy City Times, Monday, April 13; round table discussion afterward the screening
Velvet Goldmine (1996), hosted by Hank Sartin, Film section Editor and Critic, Time Out Chicago, screens Monday, April 20
The Killing of Sister George (1968), hosted by Charlie Shoquist, Film Critic, Gay Chicago Magazine [...]

Torino GLBT Film Festival 2009: Auraeus Solito’s BOY

Filipino filmmaker Auraeus Solito, best known for his 2006 Teddy Award-winning The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros, will be at the Torino GLBT Film Festival, which runs April 23-30, as a member of the international jury and to present the world premiere of his new feature, Boy, recently banned in Singapore.
In Boy, a young poet sells his comic books to afford a one-night stand with a macho rent-boy on New Year’s Eve. However, their relationship will not end that night as the boy in question will learn to accept his sexuality.
Tuli (2005) and Philippine Science (2007); the latter follows eight students at the elite [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: TO FARO, BABY LOVE, Lesbian Shorts

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Wednesday, April 8, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

"Mortal Desires"
Vampires, hoodlums, a hot detective and a few high class call girls make up this programme of sexy lesbian shorts.
In Twilight’s Shadow (above)
USA 2008. Dir T.M. Scorzafava. 12min.
Carlisle’s girlfriend is being held hostage and she’ll do all it takes to get her girl back before sunrise.
Crazy Baby
USA 2008. Dir Jules Nurrish. 3min.
An unhinged patient, a sexy nurse and a very large needle…
Liminal
USA 2008. Dir Stephen Keep Mills. 14min.
A powerplay between lovers escalates with devastating results.
At Home (or Love as well)
Spain 2008. Dir Mariel Macia. 25min.
Rosa’s first time has to be perfect.
What I found in [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: DREAM BOY, SOCIETY

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Monday, April 6, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

"Home"
An international selection of films exploring the idea of home.
Lot’s Wife
Turkey 2008. Dir Harjant Gill, Koray Durak. 9min.
A reworking of the biblical story of Lot’s wife, set in the outskirts of Istanbul, where three uncles intend to break up a happy home.
Boxed In
USA 2007. Dir Joy E. Reed. 10min.
A comedy demonstrating the importance of clearing out your closet when you move home.
The Turkey
France 2008. Dir Anna Margarita Albelo. 10min.
A wife and mother runs off with her battery operated birthday present.
Two Spirits
USA 2007. Dir Ruth Fertig. 22min.
Queer Native Americans fight to reclaim the place of honour [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: WRANGLER: ANATOMY OF AN ICON, CHEF’S SPECIAL

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Sunday, April 5, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

Out Late

Directed by:
Beatrice Alda, Jennifer Brooke

Country:
USA

Year:
2008

Running time:
62min

 
A truly inspiring and important film about the experiences of LGBT elders, specifically those who have come out in their sixties and seventies. There are stories about coming out in church, discovering The L Word for the first time at eighty and transitioning from male to female after a lifetime in the navy and raising a family. The film movingly explores the difficulties and liberation of discovering sexuality later in life and in particular highlights the often unsuccessful search for life partners in a world that places so much value [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: APRES LUI, FUCKING DIFFERENT TEL AVIV

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Saturday, April 4, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

Après lui

Directed by:
Gaël Morel

Cast:
Catherine Deneuve, Thomas Dumerchez, Adrien Jolivet

Country:
France

Year:
2007

Running time:
90min

 
Following the sudden death of her son Mathieu in a car accident, Camille (Catherine Deneuve) reaches out to his best friend Franck in an attempt to cope with her loss and gain a focus for her pain. However, this initially cathartic relationship soon begins to border on the obsessive, and Camille’s family begin to question her state of mind as she devotes more and more time to Franck. While the film hints at a possible sexual relationship between Franck and Mathieu in the opening scenes, sexuality is not [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: BANDAGED, 57000 KM BETWEEN US

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Friday, April 3, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

Johanna D’Arc of Mongolia

Directed by:
Ulrike Ottinger

Cast:
Delphine Seyrig Xu Re Huar, Inès Sastre

Country:
West Germany

Year:
1989

Running time:
165min

 
All aboard the Trans-Siberian railway where you’ll find titled ladies, Broadway stars, camp cabaret acts and a Mongolian princess who has come to kidnap them all. This sumptuous epic from Ottinger ranges from the obvious artifice of a studio film to an almost documentary realism when the film moves from train to the glorious vista of the Mongolian landscape. As the culture clash between the Western women and their Mongolian ‘hosts’ intensifies a sweet love affair blossoms between the princess and the young Giovanna, [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: GHOSTED, THE AMERICAN SOLDIER

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Wednesday, April 1, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

Before Stonewall

Directed by:
Greta Schiller, Robert Rosenberg

Distributor:
Peccadillo Pictures

Country:
USA

Year:
1984

Running time:
87min

 
25 years ago this film felt like a revelation of a hidden gay history. Conventional wisdom had defined the modern movement for gay liberation from the riots at the Stonewall Inn in New York, however, this film shows just how much activism and creativity haad been going on before 1969. A dazzling line-up of interviewees includes poets, writers, political organizers, dancers, actors who bear witness to a life before Stonewall, including Allen Ginsberg, Audre Lorde, Barbara Gittings, Harry Hay, Ann Bannon and many more.
The courage and bravery of those [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: PEDRO, MADAME X: AN ABSOLUTE RULER

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Tuesday, March 31, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

Madame X – An Absolute Ruler

Directed by:
Ulrike Ottinger

Cast:
Tabea Blumenschein

Country:
West Germany

Year:
1977

Running time:
141min

 
Adventure and fun on the high seas comes at a price for this band of stereotyped women, who answer a call to join Madame X on her ship Chinese Orlando and experience a life without rules and patriarchal tyranny. However old roles reassert themselves and the women find themselves swapping one kind of servitude for another as Madame X demands complete devotion from her shipmates, even the ones she is enamoured with.
An early low-budget film from renowned avant-garde filmmaker [Ulrike] Ottinger, who actually took all crew positions [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: EROS O BASILEUS, STEAM

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Monday, March 30, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

Lion’s Den

Directed by:
Pablo Trapero

Cast:
Martina Gusman, Elli Medeiros, Laura García

Distributor:
Unanimous Pictures

Country:
Argentina

Year:
2008

Running time:
113min

 
Julia, a two weeks pregnant 25-year-old student is sent to prison for a crime she may or may not have committed – the murder of her boyfriend’s male lover. No one can remember what happened that night, and as Julia adjusts to life inside prison walls, gradually commanding respect from other inmates on the ‘maternity’ wing and developing a tender and loving relationship with fellow internee Marta, she not only has to fight her wrongful incarceration, but also for her son Tomas, born inside prison and due [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: BORN IN 68, Latin American Shorts

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Sunday, March 29, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

Born in 68

Directed by:
Jacques Martineau, Olivier Ducastel

Cast:
Laetitia Casta, Yannick Renier, Yann Trégouët

Distributor:
Peccadillo Pictures

Country:
France

Year:
2008

Running time:
170min

 
Festival favourites Martineau and Ducastel return to the LLGFF with an epic drama covering life and sexual politics in France. Friends and lovers caught up in the excitement of May ‘68 at the Sorbonne eventually leave Paris for a communal life in the country. The collective seems at first like a fairytale of left wing hippydom. But principles are betrayed as members of the commune drift away to bourgeois careers. Laetitia Casta gives a great performance as the central figure, Catherine, loved by [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: DOLLS, THE DEVIL’S CLEAVAGE

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Saturday, March 28, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

Dolls

Directed by:
Karin Babinská

Cast:
Marie Dolezalová, Sandra Nováková, Petra Nesvacilova

Country:
Czech Republic

Year:
2007

Running time:
99min

 
This debut feature from Karin Babinská is a beautifully made and poignant coming of age tale, about three best friends from high school embarking on their last summer together before going their separate ways at summer’s end. Iska, struggling to understand her burgeoning sexuality and why she feels different from other girls, has been forced to join her little brother Vojta at a summer camp for athletes. Whilst he can back flip and somersault like a pro, the timid Iska can barely hold her own against a punch [...]

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009: Fred Halsted, THE NAKED CIVIL SERVANT

London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival 2009
Friday, March 27, highlights
Schedule and synopses from the LLGFF website
 

The Naked Civil Servant

Directed by:
Jack Gold

Cast:
John Hurt, Liz Gebhardt, Patricia Hodge

Country:
UK

Year:
1975

Running time:
85min

 
This dramatization of Quentin [Crisp]’s first volume of autobiography won BAFTAs for its director Jack Gold and its star. John Hurt gives a dazzling performance as the young Quentin, a flame-haired flamboyant homosexual when such things were not permitted. It contains much of the wit and wisdom of Quentin and celebrates a life lived in a refusal to conform. The highlight is Quentin’s impassioned speech from the dock when charged with soliciting for an immoral purpose.
Plus an interview with Bernard Braden filmed in 1967. Previously [...]

OTTO; OR, UP WITH DEAD PEOPLE, THE LARAMIE PROJECT Offend

Tina O’Grady, a member of the Ohio Department of Public Safety’s "cultural competency initiative" was scolded by her boss after co-workers complained about an e-mail she had forwarded promoting the gay-themed Out@Wex Film Festival in Columbus.
As per the Columbus Dispatch, O’Grady’s co-workers seemed to be particularly offended by the festival’s description of Bruce LaBruce’s Otto; or, Up With Dead People in its release. Otto is summed up as an "art-porn provocation [that] depicts an explosion of cannibalistic, sodomy-seeking zombies in Berlin."
What exactly in that sentence — art, porn, provocation, explosion, cannibalism, sodomy, zombies, Berlin — offended some of the Ohio Department of Public Safety workers remains unclear.
The judges at the Milan International Lesbian and [...]

Torino GLBT Film Festival 2009: Tributes & Retrospectives

"From Sodom to Hollywood," that’s the tagline of the Torino GLBT Film Festival, whose 24th edition runs from April 23-30, 2009.
Among the 2009 Turin festival highlights are a retrospective of director Giuseppe Patroni Griffi’s "transgressive" oeuvre; an homage to Catalan filmmaker Ventura Pons, whose Food of Love I highly recommend; and the sidebar Muscles in Skirts: The Italian Peplums, featuring bulging pecs and thighs in sword-and-sandal epics of the 1950s and 1960s.
Also, Barbara Hammer’s latest two movies; screenings of Wieland Speck’s Westler (1985) and Heiner Carow’s Coming Out (1989), both set in Berlin during the time when The Wall was still standing; tributes to Filippo Timi, Guy Gilles, Adolfo Arrieta, and Dorothy Porter; and filmmaker Ferzan Ozpetek [...]

DAYS OF ‘36 d: Theo Angelopoulos

Meres tou ‘36 / Days of ‘36 (1972)
Direction: Theo Angelopoulos
Screenplay: Theo Angelopoulos, Petros Markaris, Thanassis Valtinos and Stratis Karras
Cast: Giorgos Kiritsis, Christoforos Chimaras, Takis Doukakos, Kostas Pavlou, Petros Zarkadis, Christophoros Nezer
 

 
By Dan Schneider of Cosmoetica:
Greek film director Theo Angelopoulos‘ 1972 effort Meres Tou ‘36 / Days of ‘36, winner of the International Film Critics Association award at the Berlin Film Festival, is the least of the several films of his that I’ve seen. It is also, by over a decade and a half, the earliest one I’ve seen so far, and at one hour and 45 minutes it is by a good margin the shortest as well. [...]

HAPPY HOLIDAYS: Q&A with Filmmaker James C. Ferguson

I’m always happy when a filmmaker is inspired by Woody Allen — as opposed to, say, Quentin Tarantino or Zack Snyder.
Case in point: First-timer James C. Ferguson (right, in blue), whose Happy Holidays (written by Ferguson and Tom Misuraca) is a three-way character study about old school friends who are reunited at their Connecticut hometown for a brief period right before Christmas. During that time, deeply buried emotions burst to the surface, old secrets are revealed, and one character ends up suffering a nervous breakdown. Old buddies can do that to you.
Shot in black in white during the course of two weeks, Happy Holidays features Paul Hungerford as Patrick Donovan, an openly gay man and avowed [...]

Salvatore Samperi

Director Salvatore Samperi, the maestro dell’erotismo all’italiana best known for the 1973 social/sex comedy Malizia / Malicious (above), died on March 4 in Bracciano, near Rome. He was 64.
Invariably pushing the boundaries of the socially — and erotically — acceptable by the hypocritical, image-conscious bourgeoisie in Italy and elsewhere, the Padua-born (July 26, 1944), former left-wing militant tackled subjects that American movies, with rare exceptions, wouldn’t dare get close to then or now.

For instance, Grazie, Zia / Thank You, Aunt (above, 1968), his feature-film debut (inspired by mentor Marco Bellocchio’s I Pugni in tasca / Fist in His Pocket), tells the story of a wealthy young man (Fist in His Pocket leading man Lou Castel) who [...]

MIDNIGHT COWBOY at the DGA in New York City

John Schlesinger’s 1969 socio-psychological drama Midnight Cowboy, one of the better best picture Oscar winners, will be screened as part of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ “Monday Nights with Oscar” series on Monday, March 16, at 7:30 p.m. at the Directors Guild of America Theatre in New York City.
David V. Picker, the executive-in-charge at United Artists during the making of Midnight Cowboy, will moderate an onstage discussion with Academy Award-winning producer Jerome Hellman, Academy Award-nominated (supporting) actress Sylvia Miles, actor Bob Balaban, cinematographer Adam Holender, composer John Barry, and costume designer Ann Roth.
Adapted by Waldo Salt from James Leo Herlihy’s novel, Midnight Cowboy stars [...]

Fusion 2009: Los Angeles Gay People of Color Film Festival

Fusion 2009: The Sixth Annual Los Angeles LGBT People of Color Film Festival will be presented by Outfest and HBO on March 6-8, 2009. The three-day festival includes screenings of features and short films, in addition to panels, workshops, and parties throughout the Los Angeles area. The screenings will be held at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood; the panels and workshops will take place at Universal Studios and the Village at Ed Gould Plaza.
As per the Outfest press release, Fusion "is a growing part of Outfest and is the only multi-racial, gender-inclusive film festival of its kind." I don’t believe that the color white is included, but I’m not going [...]

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