Even if you’re not a massive film junkie, you’ve probably heard of queer film festivals taking place in gay capitals like New York, Berlin, Sydney or Tel Aviv.
Well, here are a few new and lesser known ones that you might not have heard of before, but which definitely look worth checking out and supporting if your travels happen to be taking you through any of these countries.
OutfestPerú - Lima, Peru
The oldest of the new queer film festivals, Lima’s Outfest, has been going since 2004, and is one of the longest running in South America. It takes place in Peru’s capital each year in June for ten days or so, and in addition, the organisers also coordinate smaller festivals or individual screenings in other cities around Peru, such as Trujillo and Iquitos.
Mumbai International Queer Film Festival - Mumbai, India
Despite only starting four years ago in 2010, this is now South Asia’s largest LGBT film festival. Taking place in May each year and lasting just a week, it features films from diverse locations such as Uganda, Germany, Canada, Venezuela, Japan and India.
LGBT Film Festival - Poland
This is one of Europe’s youngest queer film festivals, and the country-wide festival features a large proportion of films from the USA and UK, so serves an English speaking audience well. Only in its fifth year since starting in 2010, it now includes screenings in cities all over Poland: Warsaw, Gdansk, Wroclaw, Lodz, Poznan, Katowice and Krakow.
&Proud - Yangon, Myanmar
Myanmar’s first ever queer film festival launches this month, lasting for only two days and will take place at the city’s French Institute. Unusually, all screenings are free of charge and films will be subtitled in both Burmese and English, if the film is not already in English. The small selection of films are mostly from around South East Asia, but with a few submission from Europe too.
