Film Categories: sexuality

  • Whatever Happened to Jackie Shane?

    Toronto, 1963. Jackie Shane – a black, queer, soul-singing, flamboyant Nashville-born, Toronto-based musician – had a hit song on the charts. The song was a sensation, and with the lyrics “Tell her that I’m happy, tell her that’s I’m gay; tell her I wouldn’t have it any other way”, it was also an underground gay anthem. But before being able to fully enjoy the fruits of this success, Jackie suddenly disappeared. Uncovering this forgotten piece of Toronto queer music history, artists Hortie and Reynolds recreate Jackie’s story using original shadow puppets, overhead animation and stop motion techniques. Follow Jackie through…

  • Midnight at the Continental

    Toronto, 1955. In the heart of Chinatown, a new bar opens: The Continental. It’s dark, grimy, and attracts an unusual clientele. Local tabloids scream in 20-point font: “Sapphos overflow Chinatown!” The bar becomes the meeting place for two of Toronto’s marginalized communities: Chinese-Canadian men and lesbians living “the life” full time. Recounting this forgotten piece of Toronto queer history, artists Hortie and Reynolds tell the story of Toronto’s first long-standing lesbian bar using original shadow puppets, overhead projector animation and archival images. Pull a stool up to the bar and watch lesbians and Chinese men stand side by side, battling…

  • Meet Me Under the Clock

    “Meet Me Under the Clock” explores a little-known time in Toronto’s LGBTQ history when an underground Halloween tradition became an annual confrontation between an invisible gay community and a fascinated, often hateful public. “Meet Me Under the Clock” tells the story of Halloween at the St Charles Tavern, a Yonge Street gay bar, throughout the 1970s. Each year, thousands of straight spectators would gather to throw eggs and jeer at the men attending the bar’s annual drag party. This unknown Toronto history highlights the role that LGBTQ spaces play in providing sanctuary and community, the complicated relationship between the LGBTQ…

  • Exhumation

    Peeling back the shrouded image, “Exhumation” is a reanimation of long-lost desire. A response to news of a celebrity paternity suit and the mythology adhered to it, “Exhumation” obsesses over buried memories to create one’s own monster from memory. Re-composed of images chemically treated to disintegrate, the figures peel their identities away to remain as ghosts of what once was. At once a diary of a death mask and of speculative hope, “Exhumation” dives through years of hurt feelings to find that although the body was here, you vanished.

  • Outcognito

    Fear meets gay desire against an audio background of sitcom homophobia and jarring personal testimonies. Textured layers of figures, rotoscoped and real, move in and out of difficult scenarios, resolving into knowing acceptance.

  • The Shiva Callers

    When a closeted woman’s girlfriend shows up unexpectedly to her grandfather’s shiva, she must do anything in her power to stop her family from finding out.

  • REBIRTH

    “A dance ritual which turns into recreation of the self.” Transformation is a dance ritual. With every move you are born again. With every little step, you cut the umbilical cord. With every turn, you create a new shell.

  • End Conversion Therapy

    A survivor of conversion therapy navigates the New York dating scene.

  • Anonymous

    ANONYMOUS is a half-hour fictional narrative which explores the accidental meeting of two men. One is an aged veteran of the streets. The other is an overweight shoe salesman in his early 40’s. The two men end up spending an evening together. They share beer, conversation and the pirating of pornographic videos. It seems they had more in common then anyone would have guessed.

  • 3 Siblings

    Three siblings with different gender identities and sexual orientations bring us into their world during São Paulo’s LGBT Pride Month. We learn about their relationships with each other, and how they work to overcome rampant homophobia and transphobia that exists in Brazil. Best Documentary Award, Alucine Festival, Toronto, Canada, 2019