Tickets are now on sale for the first eight films of this year’s Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival. Find out what’s playing, when, and where.
Now in its 30th year, Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival is planning its biggest program yet for 2023. To whet our appetites for the full program release, they’ve released tickets for the first eight films including a tribute short film showcase of late filmmaker Stephen Cummings—who was also one of the festival’s founders.
“Our 30th anniversary is the perfect time to celebrate impactful Australian creatives from our rich history to honour and recognise those who have shaped our queer culture and introduce them to younger audience members so their legacy and impact lives on, because we need to understand and experience our history to create our future,” explains Queer Screen Festival Director Lisa Rose. “The hosting of World Pride in Sydney also gives us the opportunity to showcase our brilliant Australian storytelling to a new international audience while sharing the best of the new global films with our always amazing Australian audiences.”
The Festival will screen from 15 February to 2 March in Sydney at eight venues including Event Cinemas (George Street), Dendy Cinema (Newtown) and Ritz Cinemas (Randwick) as well as other venues to be announced. The fest will also be available nationally on-demand.
Here are the first films to be released:
Stephen Cummins Retrospective Gala
A celebration of Australian filmmaker Stephen Cummins (1960-1994), who left an indelible mark on queer cinema, with a retrospective gala presentation of his complete works including award-winners Resonance, Elevation and Le Corps Image.
Lonesome
Casey, a young man from the countryside running from a small-town scandal, finds himself down and out in the big smoke of Sydney. When he meets Tib, a young city lad, struggling with his own scars of isolation, there’s chemistry, not only sexually but also emotionally as both men find something they have been missing.
You Can Live Forever
When Jaime, a gay teenager, is sent to live in a community of Jehovah’s Witnesses in small-town Quebec, she falls madly in love with a devout Witness girl. The two embark on an intense affair with consequences that will reshape the rest of their lives.
Uýra: The Rising Forest
Uýra, a trans-indigenous artist, travels through the Amazon forest on a journey of self-discovery using performance art and ancestral messages to teach indigenous youth and confront structural racism and transphobia in Brazil.
Gateways Grind
What do you picture when you think of King’s Road? The swinging 60s? Vivienne Westwood pioneering punk fashion? One notable establishment in this enclave of history that’s often forgotten about is Gateways, London’s longest-surviving lesbian club.
In from the Side
Mark, a new and inexperienced rugby club member, finds himself drawn to Warren, a seasoned first-team player. When a series of happenstances at an away fixture lead to a drunken encounter, they unwittingly embark on a romantic affair they struggle to hide from their partners and teammates. As the secret begins to unravel, team spirit, loyalties, and camaraderie are tested.
Mars One
A lower-middle-class Black family of four tries to keep their spirits up and their dreams going in the months that follow the election of a right-wing president, a man who represents everything they are not.
Vegas in Space
In this 1991 lo-fi drag queen cult classic, three soldiers are ordered to change their gender (via a pill) and are sent on a secret mission (undercover as show girls) to the women only planet of Clitoris’ capital city “Vegas in Space.” Once they arrive, they must maneuver through complex politics and decadent parties, to uncover a plot to disrupt the most important pleasure planet in the Universe.
