We’ve announced the first four events for SQIFF 2018 – and tickets are on sale now!
SQIFF 2018 kicks off on Wednesday 5 December at Glasgow Film Theatre with Opening Night Shorts– an exciting and boundary-pushing night of contemporary LGBTQ+ shorts from around the world, all seen in Scotland for the first time. Headlining is VISIBLE, created by SQIFF favourite Campbell X and Kayza Rose, who explore QTIPOC (queer trans intersex people of colour) histories, challenging mainstream perceptions and sanitisation of legacies, and celebrating complexity, multiplicity, myths, gossip and legends.
Also at GFT is the Scottish premiere of the intimate true tale of the all black, women-owned lesbian strip club operating in LA from the late 90s –Shakedown (Sun 9 December).
Director Leilah Weinraub’s film chronicles the explicit performances and personal relationships of the party’s dancers and organisers, including Ronnie-Ron, Shakedown Productions’ creator and emcee; Mahogany, the legendary “mother” of the community; Egypt, their star performer; and Jazmine, the “Queen” of Shakedown. We are delighted that Leilah will join us after the screening for a Q&A, presented in partnership with Scottish Documentary Institute.
SQIFF will host the Scottish premiere of Jason Barker’s feature debut A Deal With The Universe (Sun 9 December). Autobiographical and made entirely from personal archive and home video diaries, the film follows Jason’s incredible story of how he came to give birth to his child as a trans man, charting over 15 years of his and his partner’s life. This film is ground-breaking in terms of its intimate insights into gender identity and new parenthood and Jason will be in attendance after the screening, taking part in a discussion hosted by Rainbow Families.
Dykes, Camera, Action! + BOOM BUST: Feminist Filmmakers Blowing Up the Canon (Friday 7 December) is an event exploring the history of lesbians seeing themselves on screen, between Stonewall, the feminist movement and the experimental cinema of the 1970s. In Dykes, Camera, Action!filmmakers Barbara Hammer, Su Friedrich, Rose Troche, Cheryl Dunye, Yoruba Richen, Desiree Akhavan, Vicky Du, Jenni Olson, film critic B. Ruby Rich, and others share moving and often hilarious stories from their lives and discuss how they’ve expressed queer identity through film. BOOM BUST is a special presentation from writer and activist So Mayer (Political Animals: The New Feminist Cinema; curator, Club des Femmes), who brings their feminist film toolkit to SQIFF. With wise words and talking points from feminist filmmakers and critics from around the globe, So will set out why things need to change, and what we – as viewers, critics, programmers, and activists – can learn and do to take down mainstream cinema, while having ‘dykes,camera, action’-inspired fun on the way.
Tickets to all events are on sale now and are priced on a pay-what-you-can sliding scale of £0-£8 based on individual circumstances. In order to make the SQIFF further accessible to more people, all films will be screened with English language captions for D/deaf and Hard of Hearing access with BSL interpretation and audio description available at select events.
Our full programme will be announced on 25 October. SQIFF 2018 is funded by Creative Scotland.