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Qaleidoscope takes QTBIPOC film on tour

An annual festival that boasts a stacked line up of Canadian filmmakers exploring identity, sexuality, gender and race is making a tour stop in Yellowknife.

photo courtesy of Queer City Cinema
Thirza Cuthand in a still from the short film 2 Spirit Introductory Special $19.99

The namesake Qaleidoscope contends that the tour showcases a broad spectrum of viewpoint and expression of sexual identity and race, said Gary Varro, executive and artistic director of Queer City Cinema.

A majority of the films are made by Indigenous artists and traverse genre from documentary to animation and experimental. Some films are shot on analog and then digitized.

On Jan. 25 and 26, the festival presented by Regina-based Queer City Cinema will show 22 films by Canadian artists.

It will feature artist Thirza Cuthand in a free live performance and artist talk with Thirza Cuthand, a Plains Cree filmmaker. Love Is The Only Socially Acceptable Psychosis will show Jan. 26 at 7 p.m. at Northern United Place and an artist talk at 12 p.m.

“Difficult work is important too. She floats between really funny and really serious and raw. She’s an open book, that one,” said Varro.
Cuthand’s performance alternates between live and recordings as vessel for uncontrollable emotions, connecting the experience of falling in love with that of manic psychosis.

Cuthand uses “ritualistic” performance and video projection in the privacy of her living room during a manic episode to display magic and tragedy of love and mood disorders.

In sarcastic spirit, Cuthands short film 2 Spirit Introductory Special $19.99 makes a play on drawn out late-night cheesy infomercials.
The tour itself is meant to address marginalization and xenophobia and to give audiences an opportunity to engage with works outside the mainstream.

“Our agenda is to promote queer experimental work and to ensure a broad diversity of expression to do with gender, race and sexuality,” he said.

“It's always been there to show alternative viewpoints and a lot of ways, work that's on the margins to ensure that experimental work is represented,” said Varro.

With the advent of digital technologies, queer film festivals are programming more narrative works with actors playing roles and characters in theatrical length features, he said.

“Film that is non-narrative is more open to interpretation and maybe reflects the experiences of queer individuals where things aren’t always conventional,” he said.

photo courtesy of Queer City Cinema
A still from Doppleganger Memorandum, a claustrophic and surrealist film featuring a film-score composer distracted by a haunted video monitor.

Fluids, a sci-fi porno, is one film that encapsulates fluidity of identity, said Varro.

“I’ve always liked films that are about personal expression. It’s more intimate and very personal, it’s vulnerable and kind of brave,” he said.

The festival is sure to include diverse representations of identity and experimental works.

“(Experimental) is one of those genres that is not super represented in a lot of queer film festivals. People find it challenging and difficult to understand and because it is non-narrative and can be difficult for people to find meaning in it,” he said.

“It’s like building a new vocabulary or a new language. If you watch it long enough, it’s not necessarily meant to be understood,” said Varro.

Where We Were Not – Feeling Reserved, Alexus' Story by Jess MacCormack is a animated short documentary chronicling practices of police brutality against First Nations peoples. It documents “starlight tours” – the practice of police officers driving Indigenous people to the outskirts of town and leaving them to freeze to death.

Paskw‚w Mostos Iskwisis (Buffalo Girl) sets the extermination of buffalo in parallel to the loss of Queer Indigenous and Two Spirit knowledge.

Do I Have Boobs Now follows Victoria-based trans activist Courtney Demone in her viral campaign #DoIHaveBoobsNow, which follows her transition while undergoing hormone replacement therapy. The film visits themes of social media censorship, sexualization of feminine bodies and being in the spotlight as a trans activist and queer feminist.

The festival will show films from renowned Cree-Canadian artist Kent Monkman and Niagara, a short by Mohawk filmmaker and visual artist Shelley Niro, who explores culture and identity with sly humour.