Calgary’s only queer film festival thrives at 16
Sweet 16: The teenage milestone conjures heady images of unwanted acne lengthy and awkward make-out sessions Molly Ringwald and the eternal Sixteen Candles .
The Fairy Tales Film Festival celebrates its 16th anniversary this year. And just like a John Hughes coming-of-age flick Fairy Tales has continued to mature and grow from a small community members-funded event to one of Canada’s biggest LGBT film festivals.
Executive director James Demers says that they’re the “only queer film festival in the Prairies” adding “Our content is solid. It has been cool to watch the festival grow from an infant to a mature teenager.”
In his three years as festival director Demers said he’s seen a huge growth in community support. The days of dismissive funders and press bomb threats and harassment seem to have passed though the festival can still be a tough sell for some. “Some people are afraid of sexuality on a corporate level” he says. There have been conflicts with funders regarding the content of the films but Demers says the festival has a firm commitment to artistic integrity. “A lot of organizations are careful playing that game” he says. “On an artistic level we don’t compromise.”
For festival newcomers Demers recommends the two gala screenings Reaching For The Moon a lesbian romance chronicling the life of poet Elizabeth Bishop and Test a drama set during the early days of the AIDS crisis in San Francisco. The screenings are followed by a gala party at the Brasserie located around the corner from the Plaza Theatre in Kensington. He adds that the closing party films are a sure bet too: the documentary Fire in the Blood examining the global AIDS drug industry followed by two dramatic features Tru Love and In The Name Of .
Fans of Star Trek alumni and Facebook superstar George Takei won’t want to miss a screening of the documentary To Be Takei and the shorts packages are always a sure bet offering a grab-bag of delights from up-and-coming filmmakers. Kink Party Night features two saucy adult docs the self-explanatory Camp Beaverton: Meet the Beavers and I’m a Porn Star followed by an after-party at Goliath’s.
Demers’ can’t-miss pick is Kate S. Logan’s harrowing documentary Kidnapped for Christ about the controversial Escuela Caribe an American-run “behaviour modification” school for wayward (read: gay) teenagers based in the Dominican Republic. Demers says the doc arose out of underground footage shot on the side while the filmmaker was creating a promotional video for the evangelical school. “There’s a reckoning coming for that industry shipping kids off to foreign continents to ‘de-gayify’ them” he says. “It takes a really critical look at these parents and the commercial industry that panders to them.”
One of the year’s most popular events Retro Night features a screening of Jamie Babbit’s 1999 comedy cult classic But I’m a Cheerleader starring Natasha Lyonne as a goody-goody teenager shipped off to a summer camp designed to reprogram the gay out of her. “Making that movie was super brave at the time” Demers says. “Films don’t age well unless they age nostalgically well. You can also see its aesthetic picked up later by films like Pleasantville .”
Repertory screenings can be a tough sell at festivals — they’re often at odds with mandates to present more contemporary work — but Demers says that not only are they a hit with audiences but provide added context and history to films often ignored during their original release. “It brings back a discussion around classic queer films and for the community provides a mentorship through film” he says. “Most people won’t remember the controversy over The Adventures of Priscilla Queen of the Desert winning an Oscar and how that freaked people out. You get a sense of how censored this content has been in the past.
“The LGBT community doesn’t have many heroes outside the mainstream media” Demers adds saying that film provides a perfect opportunity for many people to seek out and find new role models. “Most queer people that have come out in the last 25 or 30 years can tell you the first gay film they saw. It’s a significant thing seeing someone with a similar life path and feelings.”
Though there’s never a dearth of content and films to choose from — Demers says he and the programming committee see more than 400 films eventually choosing 24 for the festival — it can be difficult to define just what a “gay” movie is. “It’s a kind of catch-22” says Demers. “If you have a main character who’s queer is it a queer film? Or is it like The Boondock Saints where we learn in one scene that Willem Dafoe’s detective character is gay: are we inherently closeting the content in a way?”
He says the programming committee asks whether a film is indeed gay enough. “Is the content characters and community represented? If they’re stereotypes are they offensive or reductive? What are the politics involved?” By way of example he cites the critical and commercial hit Brokeback Mountain . “It’s a great gay film for straight people” says Demers. “[The main characters] can’t be together so one gets murdered. For the hetero audience it was this Romeo and Juliet romance but for a queer audience the content wasn’t revolutionary.”
The focus of that content has changed over the years as audiences have focused more on youth programming and anti-bullying content and less on the sui generis coming-out origin story. “The coming-out story has declined thank god” says Demers. “They’re important and revealing yes but we’re moving on from it.”
He says the emphasis on North American and international cinema seems to differ year to year. “I’m getting underground docs from Russia all the time” he says. “The means of production and accessibility for filmmakers are getting easier which means getting more political content in a timely manner.” The festival’s birth in the early ’90s says Demers provided a way for the community to tell its stories. “We’re looking for a greater audience” he says. “The challenge is do you surprise people with the queer content or just present it? There’s this misconception that if it has a primary gay character then it’s a gay film. We haven’t moved past that yet.”
Demers adds that Canadian filmmakers are also relying less on American standards and aesthetics with more specific genre films (horror mystery thriller) on the rise. “The trans content has improved so much but it still has a long way to go” he says. “Bisexual and aboriginal content are mostly absent but not because we don’t want it — we just aren’t getting it. They’re woefully under-represented because the content isn’t there. I’d like to see those communities get access to more resources to make those films.”
For more info a complete list of films and showtimes visit fairytalesfilmfest.com .
