Documentary fans have their werk cut out for them as Inside Out 2SLGBTQ+ Film Festival returns this weekend. Canada’s biggest and gayest showcase of queer cinema spotlights true stories at a time when LGBTQ+ people could use a break. (How often have we written that line?) This year’s festival includes a mix of queens and everyday icons as Inside Out uses the power of visibility to ensure that a wide variety of audiences are seen and heard in the stories on screen. The festival includes a heavy dose of Drag Race content, including two documentary profiles among the ever-growing canon of RuGirl docs. For audiences looking beyond the yassification of queer culture, the festival also salutes figures in history from musicians to athletes who helped pave the way for cinephiles seated in the theatre today.
Here are some of the documentary highlights at this year’s Inside Out 2SLGBTQ+ Film Festival:
Antidiva: The Carole Pope Confessions
Sat, May 23
Get an audience with the Pope herself as this Hot Docs favourite gets a Toronto encore! POV cover girl Carole Pope joins director Michelle Mama for a special screening of Antidiva: The Carole Pope Confessions. The documentary frequently surprises with its portrait of the Rough Trade rocker who broke barriers for queer representation, but rode a fickle road of success after trying to make it solo. Antidiva shows audiences that Pope remains one of the most truly “punk” rockers in the business as she keeps hustling from gig to gig with passion that never fades. Read more about the film in our current cover story and review from Hot Docs.
A Deeper Love: The Story of Miss Peppermint
Sat, May 23
It’s a RuPaul’s Drag Race eleganza edition of Inside Out. The film boasts several queens from the hit competition series, including in the opening night screening of the comedy Stop! That! Train!, but season nine fan favourite Miss Peppermint gets her own spotlight. She’s the latest queen in a line of Drag Race alumni to receive a doc portrait. It’s fitting, too, since Peppermint plays a significant role in the franchise’s rocky history of trans representation, and her story drew attention to the stigma that trans queens face when gender binaries rear their ugly heads in drag. The film looks at the queen who scored a runner-up spot while competing on the show, but it also provides an intimate perspective on Peppermint’s work and activism that makes her a winner worthy of a crown.
Hunky Jesus
Sun, May 24 + online
Anyone who likes a well-hung Jesus should say “Amen!” to Hunky Jesus. This fun documentary by Jennifer M. Kroot (To Be Takei) observes the annual Easter ritual held by the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence in San Francisco. The drag sisters invite San Franciscans to join their passion play, which crowns a “Hunky Jesus” annually along with a memorable (and probably not-so-virginal) “Foxy Mary.” The popular event serves as one case of the Sisters’ charity work, but also an important reminder that faith and queerness aren’t mutually exclusive facets of identity. It just might not rock every congregation’s boat to praise an “Oily Jesus” or a “Twink Jesus.” But every good church deserves a cross that doubles as a stripper pole.
In the Closet
Sun, May 24
The National Film Board of Canada ventures into the world of lifestyle programming with this non-fiction web series from filmmaker/comic Ajahnis Charly. They invite various non-binary Canadians to open the doors to their fashion-forward forms of self-expression. Guests include Two-Spirit Canada’s Drag Race contestant Chelazon Leroux, who drew both snaps and shade for wearing comfortable knitwear on the runway. The series uses a variety of tastes to illustrate how there’s no one-size fits all look for queer folks.
Give Me the Ball!
Sat, May 23
Queer superstar Billie Jean King serves tennis icon realness in this smash documentary from Liz Garbus and Elizabeth Wolff. A standout at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, Give Me the Ball! offers the documentary return to the biopic Battle of the Sexes, which starred Emma Stone as the tennis pro who changed the game for women’s sports. The film chronicles King’s fight for pay equity on the tennis courts as she and other women captured the world’s attention through their mean backhand and intense rallies. While women’s tennis grew, pay gaps widened and the battle of the sexes intensified as the women spoke up to the men’s dismay. King provides a terrific subject with engaging interviews, great style, and a knack for colourful details.
My Brother’s Killer
Sat, May 23
This true crime documentary offers a chilling reminder of the many tragic narratives that haunt LGBTQ+ history. Director Rachel Mason opens the cold case of Billy London, a gay adult film actor who was brutally murdered in 1990. The film investigates the ongoing dangers of sex work and the ways in which both queer people and sex workers are abandoned by the justice system. The film revisits previous evidence and suspects, but reveals how some persistent amateur investigation work led to a breakthrough for friends and family members seeking justice for Billy.
Out Laws
Sat, May 30 + online
The spectre of a serial killer haunts this documentary about the fight over the criminalization of same sex relationships in Namibia. Director James Lewis and Lexi Powner follow the stories of three activists pushing for change. Among the participants is Friedel Dausab, a Namibian gay rights activist who spent 25 years fighting the unconstitutionality of the country’s “buggery” law. The film situates the present efforts of activists like Dausab within the larger colonial context that shape a society to the benefit of certain citizens at the expense of the rights and freedoms of others–and asks what threats we continue to pose by positioning anyone as lesser than.
What Will I Become?
Sat, May 30 + Online
Directors Lexie Bean and Logan Rozos share a remarkably intimate and nuanced portrait of mental health among transgender men. The film considers how nearly fifty percent of trans men attempt suicide, and Bean and Rozos use their own stories as jumping off points to honour and interrogate the lives of trans men who are no longer here to share their experiences. What Will I Become? focuses on two men, Homecoming king Blake Brockington and sensitive soul Kyler Prescott, who both died by suicide after coming out. Blake and Kyler’s lives are very different on the surface, as one took the spotlight as an outspoken activist and the other was a soft-spoken teen who was only beginning to find his voice. The film, a double prize-winner at Berlin, nimbly straddles an incredibly difficult high-wire act tonally and emotionally by reflecting the challenges that transpeople face while finding levity in the joys they experienced, if only too briefly.
Heals
Sat, May 30
Inside Out goes out with its heels on, so to speak, as Drag Race Thailand judge Pangina Heals shares her story in this bio doc. The festival hosts the world premiere of Heals’ story, and it’s a pretty bold move of her to debut her movie in Canada after sending both the Canadian queens packing in Drag Race’s cutthroat first season of UK vs. the World. It’s sure to be an emotional screening as that strategy led to one of the most shocking—and, in this writer’s opinion, most dramatically satisfying eliminations ever in the series. Expect an earnest bid for an All Stars comeback and a Q&A with lots of tea and shade.
Inside Out 2SLGBTQ+ Film Festival runs May 22 to 31.
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