Queer East Film Festival; SPIDER LILIES at Genesis Cinema (26 APR).
|

NOW BOOKING: Queer East Film Festival

There’s a new film festival in town. Queer East Film Festival promotes “unheard voices of East & Southeast Asian LGBTQ+ cinema” & screens across London for two weeks from 18 APR to 02 MAY 2020. Here’s everything you need to know.

Queer East Film Festival: A DOG BARKING AT THE MOON at Curzon Goldsmiths (26 APR).
Queer East Film Festival: A DOG BARKING AT THE MOON at Curzon Goldsmiths (26 APR).

By RADIANT CIRCUS

Twitter @radiantcircus | Instagram @radiantcircus

Promising an assortment of filmmakers, activists, and academics amongst their special guests, Queer East Film Festival is bringing a newly curated season of film screenings to London. Themes to be addressed by the programme include identity, religion, family, adulthood and politics, all through the various lenses of queer relationships on screen.

The full programme launches on 13 MAR but is set to embrace some twenty-nine films (features, documentaries and shorts) including both classic films and new releases, covering 50 years of cinema from 15 countries. Many screenings will be accompanied by the kind of special features that help audiences take a deeper dive into the worlds created by the filmmakers as well as contemporary LGBTQ+ lives across Asia, a part of the world where progress with LGBTQ+ rights has been mixed, to say the least.

Queer East Film Festival: FUNERAL PARADE OF ROSES at Deptford Cinema (22 APR).
Queer East Film Festival: FUNERAL PARADE OF ROSES at Deptford Cinema (22 APR).

Early programme announcements include Ange Lee’s THE WEDDING BANQUET about a gay Taiwanese immigrant to the USA, avant-garde favourite FUNERAL PARADE OF ROSES which is enjoying renewed global attention following its 4K restoration from 35mm negatives, and A DOG BARKING AT THE MOON which is also screening at this year’s BFI Flare. Of this early bunch, we’re most excited to see SPIDER LILIES, Zero Chou’s cult 2006 film about the ambiguous relationship between two women who share a traumatic past which one the Teddy Award at the Berlin International Film Festival for Best Feature Film in 2007.

Ahead of that programme launch, we’ll let Director & Programmer of Queer East, Yi Wang, have the final words:

“The fight for LGBTQ+ rights in Asia remains strong and committed, but stereotyping, misrepresentation and discrimination still exist. This is especially true for queer people of colour, who are marginalised on the grounds of both race and sexuality, and often excluded from mainstream discourse. By introducing these brave queer storytellers from East and Southeast Asia to UK audiences, I hope Queer East can be a gentle reminder for all of us that the LGBTQ+ community should not leave anyone behind.”

And that’s the meat of it…

QUEER EAST FILM FESTIVAL

Queer East Film Festival 2020 (18 APR to 02 MAY).

Web queereast.org.uk | Instagram @queereast | Twitter @queereastfest | Facebook @queereast

#QueerEast #QEFF2020


> SEND us your screen news via Twitter DM @radiantcircus or Email.


Subscribe & support

“Home of alternative screen culture in London” (Film London)

RADIANT CIRCUS is supported entirely by readers’ monthly subscriptions. Subscribers get our unique listings emailed as well as other great rewards. With enough subscribers backing us, we will be able to: 1) keep listing far into the future, 2) expand our content to explore more indie screen events, & 3) recruit & reward a team of new contributors. Our target in 2020? One hundred new monthly subscribers supporting what they love so that many more can discover it. Subscribe at patreon.com/radiantcircus

“I love everything you’re doing with RADIANT CIRCUS, the output is brilliant. And just so great to see it grow. Kudos to you.” (A fan via email!).

#LDNindieFILM


*THE SMALL PRINT: As accurate as we could make it. Apologies for any errors. Updates & corrections will be made to the online version. Event dates/times are subject to change by the venue/organiser. We try to only list events you can book for at the time of posting: however, some events may still be sold out. Please click quickly! We don’t filter by age/certification: all readers & subscribers should be 18+.