1997 Vancouver Queer Film Festival

The Out On Screen Queer Film & Video Festival was programmed collectively by members of many Vancouver communities. This is a unique strength we share with few festivals in North America, and the range and diversity of this year’s programming is the result. This year’s festival includes many firsts....Out On Screen’s first local showcase illustrates the range and excellence of Queer film and video being made right here in Vancouver. Regional Canadian work finally gets its due with programs from the Atlantic coast and La Belle Province in More Fish in The Sea and Francoqueer, while Animated Queers shows the growing number of queers working with animation. Out On Screen is proud to welcome visiting artists Shawna Dempsey and Lorri Millan, who will be on hand to present the first retrospective of their ground-breaking film and video work Lady Golfers, Butchers & Talking Vulvas. Shari Frilot will present her video Black Nations/Queer Nations? and participate in a panel discussion around cultural production by Queers of Colour. Marusya Borciurkiw’s performance/screening As Seen On TV:Big Dykes on the Small Screen contextualizes recent consumption of queerness by the mass media. And finally, for the first time in its nine year history, Out On Screen is able to recognize excellence in film and video in the form of a juried award. Two Gerry Brunet Memorial Awards will be presented to recognize work produced in British Columbia and Canada. Increasingly, queer work about the experiences of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgendered people and how we see and experience the world has left many essentialist approaches to identity behind. This year’s films and videos often look at gender and identity as multiple, shifting and contextual. There is less an effort to create stories about how a fixed identity affects how “we” live and to show it positively, than there is a fascination with examining how the complexities of how( the influences of pop culture/media, community) and where(community, location) we live affects who we are. It has been argued queer culture is showing its maturation when it begins to critique itself in so many complex ways - this is the stuff of the 1997 programming. Some work comes easily, with laughs, lotsa sex, romance, happy endings. Much, however, is also densely layered with re-positioned fragments of our pop culture that question its role in framing our exclusion, how we look and how we experience desire. Queer film and video is building in sheer number, audiences and momentum like never before. Out On Screen is striving to keep up with such exponential growth. We invite you to witness it along with us. Get your ticket and find your seat... Jennifer Fisher Programming & Technical Coordinator