GAZE International LGBT Film Festival launched its 22nd year last Friday with a gathering at The Front Lounge, accompanied by speeches from the festival’s organisers and exhibition The Power of Our Stories. The festival’s program showcases an eclectic mix of stories representing the experiences of LGBT individuals and communities worldwide, ranging from the story of a woman transforming the gay underworld of Sydney or a transgender girl looking for love in rural Kentucky. The evening certainly had a community feel, affirming GAZE’s role in Ireland’s LGBT social network and the mutual support between the organisers, filmmakers and spectators.
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As well as the films themselves there are many other events taking place throughout the festival, including the opening and closing night galas, family events, animation workshops and panel discussions. This year will also feature the GAZE Living Room after every 8.30pm screening, which will be hosted by Festival Programmer Emma Connors, who hopes to spark more casual conversation around the films in addition to the more formal panel debates. In choosing the films for this year’s festival Connors told tn2 she sought to compile a selection of not only the most critically acclaimed films, but of the most broadly representative, showing strong support for Irish LGBT film and especially giving Irish student filmmakers an opportunity to make their voices heard. Next year GAZE plans on expanding its collaboration with students by arranging a GAZE workshop at Pink Training. Connors observed that this year’s Irish submissions focused predominantly on autobiographical coming-out narratives, lagging somewhat behind other countries in imaginative daring. This trend in Irish film perhaps reflects Ireland’s status on the global scale of LGBT rights, where it by no means the leading country, reiterating the importance of GAZE as a space for the articulation and discussion of LGBT experiences in Ireland.
GAZE offers an incredibly promising program, catering to all ages, sexualities and genders as well as providing a forum for creative and critical debate — which there is sure to be plenty of given the recent announcement of next year’s referendum on same-sex marriage, and, of course, the opening up of the debate on LGBT rights in Ireland post-Pantigate. The Power of Our Stories will be shown at the Lighthouse Cinema as part of the festival. Curator Matthew Sutton sees the exhibition as a multi-disciplinary platform for the expression of LGBT experience. Hopefully in years to come the exhibition will grow to match the impressive content of the films it accompanies. With the countless stories to be told from around the world, the infinite perspectives and subjects providing material for these movies, GAZE won’t be going anywhere anytime soon. It is certainly worth a visit this year, whether you camp out at the Lighthouse for the festival’s entirety, or just discover that one eye-opening film.
GAZE Festival will take place from 31 July – 4 August at the Lighthouse Cinema.
Tickets: €10 per film (€8 concession) / €100 weekend pass / €35 four-film pass
Opening Night Gala €25 / €20 concession
Closing Night Gala €15 / €12 concession / exhibition free
www.gaze.ie / www.lighthousecinema.ie
