GAZE Festival Director Greg Thorpe introduces the 2022 edition of the much-loved film festival, showcasing LGBTQ+ storytelling from across the globe...
Happy 30th birthday to GAZE! It’s such an honour to be steering the festival through this landmark year. As we all know it can be a bit tricky when gays turn 30, but we’re feeling fit as a fiddle and ready to welcome back audiences with smart, innovative queer cinema for all.
Looking back at three decades of LGBTQ+ cinema, while considering what this year’s festival should look like, two themes naturally occurred to me.
Firstly, the legacies of LGBTQ+ forerunners and ancestors, the people who made our lives, our freedoms, and our film festivals possible. And secondly, the roots of any and every good film festival – the art of film itself.
GAZE celebrates with a late-night screening
Fortunately for us, this year’s new films came up with the goods in abundance. In fact there is so much fantastic work that our programme will spill out into in a brand new venue for us, The Complex, where we’ll share 10 days of new queer film in a gallery setting, absolutely free, including in-conversations with artists - come join us there.
But of course the heart of GAZE remains our packed five-day cinema programme with long-term partners, IFI and Light House.
For our Opening Gala, I wanted to programme with an eye on excellent contemporary work that points to a cinematic future, selecting films we simply could not have imagined 30 years ago (and, in such taxing times, films that are downright feel-good to boot).
So expect a hilarious animated French short about same sex couples and gender variance in the natural world, and a heart-warming Spanish narrative about a transgender schoolgirl living her truth.
Our main opening feature itself, Wildhood, by the indigenous Canadian Two Spirit director, Bretten Hannam, strikes a similar heartfelt chord to the mighty Moonlight in its exploration of emerging desire and identity, proving there is an appetite, nay a demand, for LGBTQ+ narratives that centre people of colour. Wildhood will soon be a classic, so don't miss one of the few chances you’ll have to see it on the big screen, and to launch the festival with us of course!
Another backbone of GAZE has been the Irish shorts programme, and we’ve a bumper crop of outstanding films to show you from across the country. Apart from the high standard of the work, this outpouring of creativity signifies that creative communities are back together and flourishing again after you-know-what and we couldn’t be prouder to see this reflected in the programme.
If I had to pick other highlights (ask me again tomorrow and it’ll be different!) I would earnestly recommend In Her Words, an incredible literary journey through all of the greatest Sapphic authors of the twentieth century; The First Fallen, a magnetic Brazilian drama about the very first years of the AIDS crisis; the unstoppably feel-good Finnish closing movie, Girl Picture; The Art of Cruising shorts selection for some steamy and surprising outdoor thrills; and a true archive classic, one that’s even older than us, John Waters’ Pink Flamingos for your riotous Saturday night thrill.
Anyways, jump into our programme, see what catches your eye, and if you see me, say hello!
GAZE takes place from 28th September - 2nd October - find out more here.
