Programs
Thursday, June 7 / P1 / P2 /// Friday, June 8 / P3 / P4 /// Saturday, June 9 / P5 / P6 / P7 / P8
Thursday, June 7
- QCC9 - P1 - 7PM (74:40 min.)
- SHORT FILMS AND VIDEOS
Feminism, race, racism, class, identity politics, community, colonization, conceptual art, politics, religion, popular culture, gender, violence, social awareness and of course sexuality are just some of the heavy-hitting and thoughtful issues and topics found in this assemblage of short films and videos… sprinkled, of course, with a dash of humour and playful pleasurable transgression. Tashina
Caroline Monnet, Canada, 2010, 4:45 min.
A young Aboriginal girl's hopes and dreams are re-negotiated within the walls and tunnels of the institution of education. Story based on Tashina Monias (Garden Hill, MB). Using alcohol and drugs as the catalyst for a community-wide change of consciousness, a group of students at southeast collegiate in Winnipeg, MB have broken ground on the massive issue of alcohol and drug abuse in Aboriginal communities through a program called The Challenge. What started as a mere effort to curb the drinking and drugging habits of the students, by challenging them to complete abstinence, has since brought forth momentous shifts in consciousness and awareness. The trilogy (WARCHILD, TASHINA, and KWONI) celebrates three youth that have successfully endured the shift toward a life of wellness.Red Lips
Kyisha Williams, Canada, 2010, 17:47 min.
black.queer.trans.sexy.femme.slutty.cherry.red.locked up.locked down.black.whore.red lips.justice.This film begins to explore black/racialized/criminalized/queer/trans/ identity and its relationship to the prison industrial complex. It articulates links between interpersonal and systemic violence - while celebrating the (sexy) ways in which we survive and celebrate ourselves.How to Stop a Revolution
Kenji Tokawa, Canada, 2011, 11 min.
A relationship breaks down under the strain of different oppressions that keep us silent even in our most intimate spaces. Oppression works divide-and-conquer style through struggles with race and class.The Dance
Bandit Queen, Canada, 2010, 4:40 min.
"Lo-res images (suggesting surveillance or documentation) are poetically edited in this meditation on the torture at Abu Ghraib, where women are both victims and perpetrators of organized violence. “But the Abu Ghraib photographs are an event in themselves…they make it clear that the east and the west are joined intimately and unwillingly, in a diabolical pas de deux of violence and death: joined in image and reality, as perpetrators and voyeurs." - Susie Linfield, Dissent MagazineMAKING LADIES
Lesley Loksi Chan & Dilia Narduzzi, Canada, 2010, 8:33 min.
Allyson Mitchell is a maximalist artist working predominantly in sculpture, installation and film. Since 1997, Mitchell has been melding feminism and pop culture to play with contemporary ideas about sexuality, autobiography, and the body, largely through the use of reclaimed textile and abandoned craft. In 2009 Allyson Mitchell's sculptural installation Ladies Sasquatch was unleashed, both delighting and frightening viewers. This short documentary gives insightful interviews with Mitchell about the layered concepts behind her provocative work. The film weaves interviews with images of her exquisitely engaging sculptures to explore the interconnections between bodies, monsters, art and the hand-made.Being Two Spirited
Candy Fox, Regina/Canada, 2012, 9 min.
Director in attendance
An exploration of what it means to be a two-spirited person through the challenges of three people and how they determine that finding balance and self-acceptance is key to fulfilment.Seeking Single White Male
Vivek Shraya, Canada, 2010, 2:20 min.
Become absorbed in this study of a brown body in (queer) white spaces.Cab Ride
Farrah Khan, Canada, 2011, 4 min.
Created as a love letter to an estranged father in the hope of return, this stop motion short presents a struggle to reconcile community expectations, transgressions and desire. The impact of longing and migration is shown through the use of colonial symbols and religious rites. The video asks how do we negotiate our families' needs and identities at the same time as our own?Mary
Kent Monkman, Canada, 2011, 3:18 min.
Shot in uber-glam shampoo-commercial-style, Mary features the gorgeous, otherworldly Miss Chief Eagle Testickle in this irreverent reinterpretation of the Prince of Wales's visit to Montreal in 1860 that challenges the meaning of "surrender" within Aboriginal treaties.Don't Ask Don't Tell GAY GAY GAY
Dayna McLeod, Canada, 2011, 2 min.
Dayna McLeod watches TV so we don't have to. Like the short description summaries that often accompany TV programs through an on-screen cable guide, Don't Ask Don't Tell Gay Gay Gay is a jump-cut/short-cut edit of Season 4, Episode 4 of Boston Legal. All excess material has been removed to effectively capture the tone of national discourse around DADT.Looking for Jiro
Tina Takemoto, USA, 2011, 6 min.
Jiro Onuma arrived in the U.S. from Japan at the age of 19 in the 1920s and was imprisoned during WWII. Queer, and an avid collector of homoerotic physique magazines, the Jiro of this film is depicted surviving the isolation, boredom, humiliation and heteronormativity of internment. This musical mash-up video features drag king performance, U.S. propaganda footage, muscle building and homoerotic bread-making.Last Kiss
Charles Lum, USA, 2011, 1:17 min.
As memento mori to a memorial, the cleaning of Oscar Wilde's tomb ignites protest, elegy, honour and fierce sentiment to historic struggle. Remembering the love that dare not speak its name.- QCC9 - P2 - 9PM (81:45 min.)
- Feature film preceded by short films and videos.
DESCRIPTIONS :: lesbian; documentary; reappropriation; experimental; identity politics; romance; humour; science fiction; B-movie; fantasy. Her Sugar Is?
Dana Claxton, Canada, 2009, 2:36 min.
A playful burlesque performance peels away layers of history to reveal a persuasive and thought-provoking dance that informs as much as it delights.Hockey Dyke in Canada
Lamathilde, Canada, 2011, 3:09 min.
Watch out! Hockey can make you into a lesbian. A little piece of Patti Schmidt's story.Co-dependent Lesbian Space Alien Seeks Same
Madeleine Olnek, USA, 2011, 76 min.
CODEPENDENT LESBIAN SPACE ALIEN SEEKS SAME tracks the adventures, misadventures and experiences of three aliens from the planet Zots, sent down to Earth on a mission to rid themselves of romantic emotions, which are considered toxic to their planet's atmosphere. They are told to have their hearts broken on Earth, where such heartbreak is considered a given. Two of the aliens, Zylar (promiscuous and sassy) and Barr (codependent and clutchy) fall into an unfortunate romance with each other, but Zoinx, the third, meets Jane, an Earthling of mild manners who lives an uneventful life and works in a stationery store. Unaware that the sudden object of her affection is an alien (despite her bald head and monotone speech), Jane falls hard for Zoinx. The feeling is mutual. Meanwhile, two undercover government agents are following Jane in order to find the spaceship and cover up the existence of the aliens. The Senior Agent has been working for years, finding himself passed over again and again for promotions, for reasons he is too dense to understand. The Rookie Agent is mysterious and focused, and something is obviously different about him. Their bizarre, comical espionage is another of the film's odd couplings, and reveals itself to be something other than what it seems. By film's end, the espionage car has one less agent, and the spaceship has one more commuter, in this original mash-up of a lo-fi New York City romantic comedy and a sci-fi B-movie spoof.
"[A] witty ode to urban love and shoestring sci-fi…enormously likable."
Jeannette Catsoulis, The New York Times
"Sweet, funny, clever comedy…Olnek's sensibility is singular, and the work of the cast—notably the sweetfaced Haas and the hilariously robotic Ziegler—make for a movie that seeks, and earns, affection."
John Anderson, Variety
"Inspired silliness—satisfyingly incongruous—and slyly subversive."
Melissa Anderson, The Village Voice