The festive closing of the festival in Prague was traditionally held in Lucerna, where we presented the best films and danced through the night all the way to the Brno part of the festival with great music around us.
It was beautiful and we had a wonderful time. Ceremony by queer music legends was worth it as well as the cinema premiere of Soldier’s Girl, which followed. After the film and transit to the club we blew out the candles and danced and danced. See you again at the 21st Mezipatra.
Ondřej Šerý, social geographer at Faculty of Science at Masaryk University told the audience about history and international context of Brno queer venues. His vivid rendition inspired a lively discussion.
Czeslaw Walek, director of Open Society and chair of Prague Pride association, commented on current legal situation of gay and lesbian couples. Participants learnt about what is important about legalization of homosexual marriages and what they can do to contribute to a successful solution.
Weren’t you at Speed Dating at Atlas café? What a pity. Have a look how many hopeful cinema couples were formed at the event.
The opening of the 20th Mezipatra in Brno at Scala cinema was moderated by Adéla Elbel. The opening screening was followed by wild Wedding Party.
On the eve of the Mezipatra opening in Brno, we commemorated the beginnings and development of the past 19 years of the festival at the opening of the 20 Years of Mezipatra exhibition. The introductory word belonged to Jiří Gutman, the director of the first edition of the festival - which was called Duha nad Brnem (Rainbow over Brno). You can see the exhibition at the Art Cinema til the end of the festival.
For the first time in the festival's history, we have included events specifically for film professionals in the program called Queering the Industry. Over the weekend, we heard a master class from director Rhys Ernst and producer Michael Raisler, we talked about financing queer films and discussed how to create networks in the film industry with our foreign guests. All the events went well and we can confirm that we will do industry program next year as well!
The Mezipatra weekend was packed! Several filmmakers have personally presented their short films (Dawid Ullgren, Gregor Valentovic and Anna Buda Flora), the legendary Mahide Lein came all the way from Berlin to screen 90's lesbian film magazines, we laughed and danced on a drag show with film topics and after the biggest party in Ankali we regenerated on Sunday brunch. We must not forget the industry program, which we processed in a separate gallery. You were a great audience!
We launched the 20th edition of the festival at the Lucerna cinema with the American indie comedy Adam, which was presented by the director Rhys Ernst himself. We were very pleased to meet you on the dance floor at the Genesis party with the DJs Mary C., mimomrtn and Šimon Holý.
