- The 17th edition of Mezipatra festival is starting in Prague today.
- The festival will screen 64 films and welcome guests from all over the world.
- Five film sections will be complemented by a rich accompanying program.
Prague part of Mezipatra Queer Film Festival is starting tonight and will last until 10th November. The overview of all film screenings and the whole accompanying program can be found on the festival's website and in the catalogue which is available in Lucerna and Světozor cinemas and other selected venues.
Tickets for individual films can be purchased at the cinema box offices or online. Visitors may choose from several sections: apart from the ten films competing in the main competition, they can see four retrospective films, one film in special screening, six documentaries, and seven thematic blocks of short films. Discussions with guests from abroad will follow after selected screenings. This year's program consists of 64 films which are connected by the topic of The Limits of Liberty.
Up-to-date information about the films and accompanying program can be found on the website, on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
International Feature Film Competition
Ten current films revolving around queer issues will participate in the main competition. There will be dramas awarded at international festivals, for example It's Only the End of the World (Just la fin du monde) by director Xavier Dolan, Portuguese The Ornithologist (O Ornitólogo) and French Staying Vertical (Rester vertical). European cinema will be represented also by Italian Arianna, Swedish fairy-tale for adults called Girls Lost (Pojkarna), and Austrian Tomcat (Kater), which will be the festival's opening film.
American independent production in the competition is represented by dramedy Other People and intimate drama Lovesong. You'll Never Be Alone (Nunca vas a estar solo), Alex Anwandter's directing debut, will arrive from Chile, and Israeli director Michal Vinik will personally introduce her romance Barash.
Retrospective section
As usual, the festival's retrospective section returns on screens films which helped to write the history of queer cinema. The oldest one this year is Victim from 1961. There are two films to represent the 1990s: Cuban Strawberry and Chocolate (Fresa y chocolate) from 1993, and German drama Aimée & Jaguar from 1999. The festival's Prague part is closing with Hedwig and the Angry Inch, a fifteen-year-old adaptation of a popular musical.
Special screening
Hustler White (1996) was directed by a legendary Canadian director and photographer, Bruce LaBruce, who is a key guest of this year's Mezipatra and one of the judges of the main competition, together with the American director Rick Castro. The film combines explicit sex scenes and pulp aesthetics with New Queer Cinema approaches, resulting in a timeless satire about the world of male prostitution and Hollywood porn industry.
Documentary production
The popular documentary section offers six films this year. American Growing Up Coy follows the story of parents suing the school board which excludes their six-year-old daughter because she is trans*. The Same Difference, which examines the life of the African-AMerican lesbian community in New York, will be personally introduced by director Nneka Onuorah.
Chemsex about the spreading phenomenon of drug consumption during sex will come from the UK. The Queen of Ireland is a portrait of Panti Bliss, a successful drag queen and political activist. Danish What He Did (Det Han Gjorde) follows the true story of a playwright who murdered his lover twenty years ago. And the novel Spanish Yes, We Fuck! focuses on the sex life of handicapped people and sexual assistance.
Visitors of Mezipatra can see short films in seven thematic blocks. A Man in Five Ways and Relationships in the Feminine Way show the most varied forms of love; Family Ties are films about families both happy and unhappy, traditional and non-traditional; the protagonists of Do You Know Who I Am? are connected through searching (and successfully finding) their own gender identity. Faded Youth studies the issues of ageing and ephemerality; Evil Among Us examines the amalgam of sex and violence and the relationship of dominance and submission. Of Murders, Bears, and Men are stylish short film with pulp aesthetics.
Juries and prizes for winners
As usual, the prize for the best feature film will be awarded by an international jury. Apart from director Bruce LaBruce, there will be Šárka Gmiterková, a film publicist and a doctoral student at the Department of Film Studies and Audiovisual Culture at the Faculty of Arts of Masaryk University in Brno, and Karel Och, the artistic director of Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.
The prize for the best short live-action film will be decided by a student jury. This year, it consists of artist, curator and publicist Markéta Garai (AVU), a member of Prague Pride marketing and PR team Matouš Harman (Faculty of Arts, Charles University), and Piaoyu Xie (FAMU), a director, writer, translator, photographer and visual artist.
The announcement of the best films will take place during the closing ceremony on Wednesday, 9th November; the winners will be awarded original prizes designed by Dechem. The festival in Prague will finish on Thursday, 10th November, by screening of the winning film.
Audiences will be able to vote for their favourite film through a simple grading system in cinemas throughout the whole festival. The winner of the audience award will be announced during the closing ceremony in Brno on Friday, 18th November.
Ticket sale at theatre box offices and online, more information on the festival's website.
Prague 3rd – 10th November
Brno 11th – 18th November
regions: Olomouc 22nd – 26th November, Hradec Králové 8th – 9th December
Visuals 2016 – photo Michaela Karásek Čejková, graphic design Marius Corradini / Side 2
Complete program and information: www.mezipatra.cz
Film trailers and other videos here
PRESS materials and photos for download:
https://mezimedia.capsa.cz
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PASSES HERE
PR contact
Larisa Blichová
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