Rated PG

Sponsored by Telus

in partnership with Humanologie

The Mind Place
Momo Movement presents The Mind Palace, a contemporary, co-created performance exploring the inner workings of the ensemble members' imaginations. This fantastical show will take you on a journey through the landscapes, emotions and visions of each individual. Prepare for the unexpected. Featuring set design and costume pieces by artists from the Indefinite Arts Centre, music by Eric Smith, and an accessible theatre experience for every body made possible by Inside Out Theatres', Good Host Program. Concept co-created by the ensemble and Kyra Newton, choreography by Kathy Austin, Shannon Parker, Chawna Exner and Kyra Newton. 

Safety in Number: A Trans History 16 min
Directed by Melinda Friedman

What was it like to be transgender before there was such a thing as a trans community? Pioneers who grew up in the 1950s and 1960s reflect on their personal experience, while young people in the community today offer their own stories.

Butch 13 min
Directed by Mia Jagpal 

SD Holman self-identifies as “butch,” a label that she and others in her community have reclaimed. Her inspiring story has challenged traditional definitions of masculinity and femininity in surprising ways.

The Two Humanologie Project
under an umbrella we met

Oliver
Actor, dancer, singer, animator, filmmaker, artist, advocate, volunteer, sibling, partner. These are all terms Oliver uses to describe himself. He also claims the identities of drag monarch, transgender, and queer. Oliver knew at a fairly young age that he would make the transition, and wants to be identified as trans for the rest of his life. He recognizes that he is who he is because of his lived experience, which is deeply rooted in where he came from and the journey he is on.

Bree
Bree is Calgarian. She is an avid gym-goer, she has completed a bunch of obstacle courses and she loves her family and her dogs. She also happens to be trans and lesbian. Bree didn't always identify with those labels. Finding herself and taking the steps to be her authentic self has been an ongoing process and the most challenging thing she has encountered in her life.

GAY CHORUS DEEP SOUTH

Directed by:  David Charles

In partnership with the Calgary Men’s Chorus 
Sponsored by National Music Centre
In response to a wave of discriminatory anti-LGBTQ laws in Southern states and the divisive 2016 election, the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus embarks on a tour of the American Deep South. Joined by allies The Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir, they bring a message of music, love and acceptance, to communities and individuals confronting intolerance.

The journey brings them into people's homes, churches and concert halls, for a celebration of the power of music to unite us in a time of difference. The trip also forces Tim and a handful of other Chorus members who fled the South, to confront their own fears, pain and prejudices, on a journey towards reconciliation. What emerges is a less divided America, where the lines that divide us; faith, politics, sexual identity are erased through the soaring power of music, humanity and a little drag.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Nc_VZr3Vdk

1h48 - Rated PG 14

Directed by Annabel Jankel

Based on the novel by Fiona Shaw, Tell It To The Bees is a story of courage in the face of terrifying intolerance.
Award winner Anna Paquin and Holliday Grainger star in this wrenching drama of a shunned small-town doctor and beekeeper in postwar Britain who befriends a struggling mother and son, helping them discover that love can be found in many forms.

Sponsored by Femmewave

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xim5MhHtbEI

Queerly Complicated Short Package
Rate PG 14

Threesome - 3m
Directed by Jessica King

F*ck Yes is a modern sex ed series focused on improving communication (and sex) between consenting adults. In this episode, a couple negotiates a threesome.

SWITCH - 18m
Directed by Marion Renard

Synopsis: During her first sexual experience, a teenager discovers she has an unsettling peculiarity. A modern-day tale of sexual development and self-acceptance.

Fuck The Boxes - 10m
Directed by Abel Rubinstein

Fuck The Boxes is about a gay teen Dan who falls in love with a non-binary female friend Ray, dealing with his first ever vagina! We want to portray non-binary people in a realistic way whilst challenging the labels of many sexualities. Gender is becoming more fluid, does this mean our sexuality will too? It certainly does for our protagonist Dan. Our relatable comedic drama aims to entertain, sometimes outrageously, whilst tackling these issues.

Positions - 12m
Directed by Justin Ducharme

A simple and naturalistic approach to a day in the life of an indigiqueer, male sex worker as he visits his clients. Positions is an unapologetic and realist exploration of sexual desire, the quest for financial stability, and the pursuit of agency over one’s own body.

Maybe Today - 3m
Directed by Sarah Rotella

The lines between reality and fantasy become blurred, when a woman who has feelings for her best friend imagines what their relationship could be if she acted on them.

 The Things You Think I’m Thinking (2017) - 14m
Directed by Sherren Lee

A black male burn-survivor and amputee goes on a date with a regularly-abled man for the first time since his accident.

 ENGAGED (2019) - 16m

Directed by David Scala

A guy tries to propose to his boyfriend multiple times, but it's never as perfect as he had imagined.

91 min
Rated PG 14

Appel en Absence (Missed call) - 1m
Directed by Kevin Cappel

A voicemail from Mom asking if her son has a girlfriend, as he is taking makeup off of his face. 

Life After - 13m
Directed by Ria Tobaccowala

“Life After” is about Nisha, a single mother and Indian immigrant, who travels to New York City to clear out her daughter Zara's apartment. Out of her element in the big city, Nisha discovers surprising new details about Zara. With help from her best friend and a stranger, Nisha uncovers the truth about her daughter’s life. 

First Girl I Loved - 5m
Directed by Anna Yuen

Content Warning: Discussions of Domestic Violence 
A short documentary interviewing queer women about the first girl they loved.

Teddy - 11m
Directed by Christopher Sweeney

What would you sacrifice for the ones you love? The tragic events of one night have robbed Paul of almost everything, and now he must decide if he is ready to step up and honour his best friend’s final wish. The debut short film from filmmaker Christopher Sweeney, a touching LGBTQ drama about love and friendship.

Infinite While it Lasts - 18m
Director and Screenplay by  Akira Kamiki

After falling in love at a party, Danny and Seiji just want to be together. However, their differences might prove stronger than their feelings. The first fiction film about asexuality.

End Conversion Therapy - 8m 
Directed by Zachary Clarence, Miranda Huba

Content warning: Contains scenes of shock therapy and abuse
A survivor of conversion therapy navigates the New York dating scene.

3 Siblings

Directed by: Sheena Rossiter

Ludmylla, Victor and Ângelo are three siblings with different gender
identities. Born and raised in one of São Paulo's favelas, they bring us
into their world during the city's LGBT Pride Month. Every year, São Paulo
hosts one of the world's largest Pride Parades to celebrate Brazil's LGBT
community. But homophobia and transphobia are still rampant in South
America's largest nation. These three siblings show us how they face these
societal challenges everyday, and how it impacts their relationships with
each other.

Rated PG 14

Bobbi and Sheelagh-12m
Directed by: Barb Taylor

Bobbi meets a mythological creature whose ancient battle for acceptance helps Bobbi overcome her own fears of being herself - a young lesbian. This animated short has been created in a traditional method with thousands of hand painted cells and pencil crayon backgrounds. Featuring Canadian actor Nisha Ahuja and Irish actor Mel Bradley.

Silvia In The Waves-13m

Noa struggles to honor the identity of his recently deceased parent while his mother tries to uphold the appearance of a conventional family. Grief and fantasy entwine to reveal the complex relationship between history and erasure, identity and memory.

Siblings in Transition-6m

Synopsis: Reaching Out empowered young activists in Metro Vancouver Pride Clubs and Gender & Sexuality Alliances (GSAs) to produce and share videos aimed at making change and building networks of allies within their local communities. This project engaged youths in Vancouver, Coquitlam, and Burnaby, providing them with extensive professional support and mentorship from filmmakers and educators. Through this project, young people created videos to communicate important social justice messages, and to engage their school and communities.

Freaky Friends
Nicholas Tufts and Aidan Vair

A conservationist/cryptozoologist and his begrudging co-host help local Canadian cryptids with their problems, all while educating kids on wildlife, healthy relationships, nutrition and acceptance.

The Lying Truths
Matthew Oliver van Diepen

A young child finds themself at a mysterious desert oasis and must confront a monster to find freedom.

Sponsored by Telus Storyhive

This year Calgary Queer Arts is delighted to host very best of HUMP! Featuring favourites from the Hump Festival from 2008 through 2017. Tour cities include Calgary, Seattle, Portland and Chicago, Vancouver, Denver, and Washington DC.

Two showings of Dan Savage’s Best of Hump back to back 7 &9 pm, Don’t Miss Out!

Sponsored by The Naked Leaf

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPs8FN7Nyc4

World Premiere: SXSW 2018, Audience Award Winner Doc Feature
1h32m

Directed By: Gabriel Silverman

Around 15,500 transgender people serve in the U.S. military, where they must conceal their gender identity because military policies ban their service. TRANSMILITARY chronicles the lives of four individuals defending their country’s freedom while fighting for their own. They put their careers and their families’ livelihoods on the line by coming out as transgender to top brass officials in the Pentagon in hopes of attaining the equal right to serve. The ban was lifted in 2016, but with President Trump now trying to reinstate it, their futures hang in the balance again.

https://vimeo.com/301392874

THE T AND OTHER TALES | PG 14

THE T Episodes 1--2
Directed by Daniel Kyri and Bea Cordelia

Synopsis: Winner of the coveted Streamy Award for best Indie web series, THE T follows Jo and Carter, a young trans woman and queer Black man, as they learn how to be best friends in the wake of their romantic relationship and Jo’s transition.

Framing Agnes-20m
Directed By:Chase Joynt, Kristen Schilt

In the late 1950s, a woman named Agnes approached the UCLA Medical Center seeking sex reassignment surgery. Her story was long considered to be exceptional and singular until never-before-seen case files of other patients were found in 2017. Watch as preeminent trans culture-makers of our time breathe new life into those who redefined gender in the midcentury. Starring Zackary Drucker (Transparent), Angelica Ross (Pose), Silas Howard (By Hook or By Crook), and Max Wolf Valerio (The Testosterone Files).

THE T Episodes 3-4
Directed by Daniel Kyri and Bea Cordelia 

In My Mother's Closet-13m
Directed by: Adri Almeida & Carolyn Wu

In My Mother's Closet' explores the intersections of being brown, trans, and a woman. Through song, Adri reconciles the struggle of wanting to belt out her truth while not wanting to risk her relationship with her religious mother. With the support of her best friend, she perseveres.

THE T Episodes 5-6
Directed by Daniel Kyri and Bea Cordelia

Missed Connections-15m
Directed by: Brandon Ho

Two strangers meet and form a bond at a festival, but they forget to exchange contact info. As they search for one another in the real world, their posts go viral, as they navigate their careers, lives, and societyʼs expectations of them as Black, female, and transgender. An LGBT love story.

Directed by John Butler - Rated PG 14
A solitary and alienated television weatherman "hires" a middle-aged Latino migrant worker to be his friend, in this darkly comedic reflection on class, ethnicity, and companionship in contemporary Los Angeles.

Sponsored by Calgary Underground Film Festival

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmtfpB6MUi0

A 20th Anniversary Screening Event 1999

Directed by Clint Alberta - 1h28min - Rated PG 14

Take a hilarious and bittersweet journey into the hearts and minds of some very ordinary, extraordinary young Canadians with this feature-length documentary. The filmmaker, assuming the role of Clint Star, seeks out his far-flung buddies, young Natives like himself. They talk about sex and life, love and abuse, and 500 years of oppression—all with humour, grace and courage. 

This screening will be followed by a Q&A with filmmaker, curator, and Vancouver Queer Film Festival Programming Coordinator Justin Ducharme (one of three experts on Clint Alberta in Canada), and tuck-in to MediaQueer-sponsored Saskatoon-berry frybread. 

This event is free to attend or pay-what-you-can!

Sponsored by Sled Island and Media Queer

Treaty 7 Film Collective Presents - 

HERE N’ QUEER: NOT GOING ANYWHERE (16+)

Curated By:

Danni Black/Sui Taa Kii is a Niitsitapi Filmmaker, storyteller, indigiqueer, and matriarch in the making. She graduated from the Adam Beach FilmInsitutute in Winnipeg, and founded the Treaty 7 Film Collective in Móhkinstsis, an extension of the Indigenous Filmmakers Association. The goals of the collective is deeply rooted in empowering representation. T7FC dedicated to uplifting the stories from BIPOC/LGBTQ2S+ communities through film on Treaty 7 land.

 Who Will Hear my Sigh? (5:12m)
Mel Vee

A woman, reflecting on her experiences as a maid in Canada, wonders who will listen to hear story; who will hear her sigh? Made as part of the 2016 Herland Video Production Workshop presented by Telus Optik Local, Calgary Society of Independent Filmmakers and Spring Street Films.

 Emerge: Stone Braids (8:37m)
Evelyn Pakinewatik
Documenting the lives of loved ones during Toronto's inaugural Indigenous Fashion Week.

 Local Degenerates (5m)
Nofac3 / Khrysta Lloren

Local Degenerates is a documentary web series that features Calgary's Queer Underground scene. From drag events such as Pink Flamingos, to queer pop-up dance parties like Fudge Packer Friday, the series explores a collective of artistic, fashion-conscious underground subculture that encourages weirdness and experimentation.

When Winds Crash (4:59m)
Ryan Cooper

When Winds Crash is a short documentary exploring the life of John Paul a makeup wearing genderfluid diva living on reserve.

 Fatf*ck (5m)
Korvan Little-Feather

Korvan Little-Feather is a has-been Indigenous child star vying to revive his past experiences as a celebrity but he is finding quickly that to be who he wants he has to change everything about himself.

 Nite Ride (13m)
Danni Black & Olivia Golosky

Nite Ride centers around four friends who go on an evening bike ride while, unbeknown to them, they are being followed and eventually attacked by supernatural creatures of the night.

  Twisted Machine (trailer 2:37m)
Carolyn Wu

A Chinese-Canadian lesbian teenager captains her hockey team against the will of her mother, while dating her powerhouse jock of a teammate in secrecy.

 De-Gaga (4:20m)
Thoko Masikini

De-Gaga is a proof-of-concept for a sitcom that follows the lives of four queer friends of colour as they navigate life, love, sex, career and what it means to be an adult in a world that is in flux. De-Gaga as a piece of work sheds a light on a generation and collective that has been underrepresented. Ultimately De-Gaga is a conversation piece that is bold, brash and unapologetic.

 Positions (12m)
Justin Ducharme

A simple and naturalistic approach to a day in the life of an indigiqueer, male sex worker as he visits his clients. Positions is an unapologetic and realist exploration of sexual desire, the quest for financial stability, and the pursuit of agency over one’s own body.

 Later, In the Life (9:55)
Tamai Kobayashi

Two middle-aged butch lesbians of colour, once activists, come to a crossroads.

in their friendship when one of them starts dating

1hr27m -Rated PG 14

Directed by: Ayşe Toprak

Mr. Gay Syria follows two gay Syrian refugees who are trying to rebuild their lives. Husein is a barber in Istanbul, living a double life between his conservative family and his gay identity. Mahmoud is the founder of Syria's LGBTI movement and is a refugee in Berlin. What brings them together is a dream: to participate in an international beauty contest as an escape from their trapped lives and an answer to their invisibility. Will the dream come true or will the refugee crisis and the harsh consequences of being gay in the Muslim world shatter it to pieces?

Sponsored by: Centre For Newcomers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjO5SvEAYh0

DYKES, CAMERA, ACTION (World Premiere Frameline 2018) - 61m - Rated PG14

Directed by: Caroline Berler

Lesbians didn't always get to see themselves on screen. But between Stonewall, the feminist movement, and the experimental cinema of the 1970s, they built visibility, and transformed the social imagination about queerness. Filmmakers Barbara Hammer, Su Friedrich, Rose Troche, Cheryl Dunye, Yoruba Richen, Desiree Akhavan, Vicky Du, film critic B. Ruby Rich, Jenni Olson, and others share moving and often hilarious stories from their lives and discuss how they've expressed queer identity through film.  A history of queer cinema from the women who made it happen.

My Fuzzy Valentine- 5m 
Directed by: Ben Edelberg

Put the Playboy centrefold in the hands of a Dyke and she will make her into a monster.

A pulsating world of bug-eyed lesbian sasquatches and vaginal caves created from reclaimed textiles. Visual artist Allyson Mitchell’s shape shifting materials and colors explode off the screen on hand processed and scratched 16mm film.

Sponsored by Calgary Society of Independent Filmmakers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qfv7arAi9po

The Garden Left Behind (World Premiere SXSW 2019) - 1h28m -Rated PG 14

Directed by Flavio Alves

This powerful film traces the relationship between Tina, a young Latinx trans woman, and Eliana, her grandmother, as they navigate Tina's transition and struggle to build a life for themselves as undocumented immigrants in New York City.

Sponsored by The Calgary International Film Festival

This event will be staffed with mental health professionals for those who feel a need to debrief following the events emotional content

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8enb4lawNA&t=60s

Tackling Life  -1h33m  -Rated PG 14

Directed by  by Johannes List

Adam, Nico and Su are members of Germany’s first gay rugby team, the Berlin Bruisers. Tackling Life portrays their everyday lives and follows them into the world of this dangerous niche sport, showing their struggle for recognition – in competition with the hetero regional league teams – as well as their community involvement: gathering money at colorful fundraisers and visiting schools to give anti-bullying workshops.

Sponsored by The Calgary European Film Festival

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_p_NRRKJ10&t=29s