Gender Studies

Shot in Cambodia over 5 years, Lotus Sports Club, is an inspiring coming-of-age story that centers around Leak, a teenage trans man who plays football in the under-21s women’s team of Kampong Chhnang, and Pa Vann, the coach and father-figure to Leak and other LGBTQ+ players on the team. This compelling, fascinating, and empowering story will take the viewers on a unique and emotional journey through a world of love and solidarity between individuals who have finally found a community they would only have dreamt before.

BEYOND THE AGGRESSIVES: 25 YEARS LATER

Two decades ago, the groundbreaking film The Aggressives showcased the remarkable stories of Chin, Octavio, Trevon, and Kisha — a watershed moment of visibility for masc-presenting BIPOC individuals that gave voice to a community that hadn’t seen themselves authentically represented in cinema before. Now, nearly 20 years later, the same four protagonists reunite to reflect on their past and envision new futures.

APOLONIA, APOLONIA

Lea Glob has followed French artist Apolonia Sokol over 13 years. The result is an extraordinarily up-close and personal film that is both a portrait of the life of a unique artist and of the budding friendship and intimacy between two women over a long and formative period in their lives. A look at art, love, motherhood, sexuality, representation, and how to succeed in a world dominated by patriarchy, capitalism and war, without losing oneself.

DEAR THIRTEEN

An incisive and timely documentary, Dear Thirteen weaves together nine stories of thirteen-year-olds from across the globe. Video diaries and candid interviews reveal how global issues are shaping – and being shaped by – young people: gender identity, rising anti-Semitism, gun violence, and racial divisions. This empathetic portrait of a new generation goes beyond stereotypes of adolescence to capture the complexity of finding a way into adulthood today.

AFGHAN DREAMERS

In Afghanistan, an all-girl robotics team risk everything to prove they can build a name for themselves in the world. Working in secret under the Taliban regime and in a male-dominated cultural environment, the girls encounter enormous challenges. With exceptional access, Afghan Dreamers tells an insprirational story about an extraodinarily brave group of young women.

ANHELL69

After members of the queer scene in Medellín, Colombia are cast for a vampire movie, the film’s protagonist dies of a heroin overdose at age 21. As the youth in Colombia grapple with a disarmingly high rate of suicide and drug overdoses, the documentary Anhell69 explores this generation’s “no future” mindset while chronicling the making of a new film, a film without borders or genders: a “trans film” about all those people who don’t belong to anything or anyone.

QUEER AND FRUM

A moving and powerful short documentary, Queer and Frum is the story of two former Orthodox Jews, Chaim Levin and Lieb Swartz-Brownstein, and their unique journeys to becoming openly queer. Shot in Orthodox neighborhoods of New York City, the documentary takes a deep look into Hasidic life and the experience of living with intersecting identities in a religious world.

ANAMNESIS

How to portray a murderer? For many years filmmakers of this documentary were in intensive contact with Stefan S., who murdered a colleague 15 years ago. Now it’s his last year in jail, and he is being prepared for his return to society. This includes undergoing various types of therapy, including group sessions on “Masculinity and Identity.” An intriguing study on the elusiveness of truth and one of the most progressive programs for the treatment of violent criminals.

BROTHERHOOD

Jabir, Usama and Useir, are three young Bosnian brothers, who grew up in the shadow of their father, a strict Islamist preacher. When he gets sentenced to two years in prison, for terrorism, the three brothers are suddenly left alone. They can explore the newly acquired freedom on the difficult journey to becoming men. Brotherhood is an exploration of youth, manhood and search for identity.

PACIFICTION

Named the Best Film of the Year by Cahiers du Cinema, and acclaimed by numerous publications, Pacifiction is a mesmerizing feature from filmmaker Albert Serra that follows a French bureaucrat (Benoit Magimel in an extraordinary performance) drifting through a fateful trip to a French Polynesian island. "One of the most beautiful and rigorously introspective movies of this or any year, a film that makes you deeply ponder the fate of humanity itself."(IndieWire)

CODED: THE HIDDEN LOVE OF J.C. LEYENDECKER

J.C. Leyendecker was one of the most prominent artists of his time, but his story is largely forgotten. Forced to keep his sexuality a secret, his coded imagery spoke directly to the gay community and laid the foundation for LGBTQ+ representation in advertising today.

NORTH BY CURRENT

A visual rumination on the understated relationships between mothers and children, truths and myths, losses and gains. After the inconclusive death of his young niece, filmmaker Angelo Madsen Minax returns to his rural Michigan hometown, preparing to make a film about a broken criminal justice system. Instead, he pivots to excavate the depths of generational addiction, Christian fervor, and trans embodiment.

THE MOUTH OF THE WOLF

This haunting documentary from acclaimed filmmaker Pietro Marcello, director of Martin Eden and Lost and Beautiful is a sui generis love story, following the 20-year relationship between a Sicilian heavy named Vincenzo and a trans convict named Mary after their meet-cute in prison. But Marcello isn’t merely content to render their romance in all its love and complexity: The Mouth of the Wolf is also a lyrical, sensuous, and melancholy tribute to the port city of Genoa, capturing its singular aura and its intoxicating air of eternity.

TRIPLE CONSCIOUSNESS: Films by Akosua Adoma Owusu

Akosua Adoma Owusu is a Ghanaian-American filmmaker, producer and cinematographer whose award-winning work addresses the collision of identities, and themes such as feminism, queerness and African immigrants interacting in African, white American, and black American culture. This edition presents thirteen of her short films.

EL REMOLINO (THE SWIRL)

In recent years, the town of El Remolino in Chiapas, Mexico has suffered from some of the country's worst flooding. This lyrical documentary surveys the social and ecological impact, from schools that can't open to farms that can no longer operate.

FORT BUCHANAN

A bracingly original debut, filmmaker Benjamin Crotty uses the tragicomic plight of a frail young man stranded at a military outpost amid a lascivious band of army wives to craft a queer soap opera for the ages.

ORIENTED

An exceptional, inspirational documentary about three gay Palestinian friends in Tel Aviv who form a non-violent group to fight for gender and national equality.

VICTORY DAY

A courageous, essential portrait of what its like to be gay in Russia today, from Alina Rudnitskaya, one of the country's most important filmmakers.