Les reines du drame (Queens of Drama)

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From the tormented little mermaid to the fulfilled woman she is today, Gigi tells us about her gender transition with humor and sensitivity.

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The central comma rivening the title signifies the split down the middle of this concise, incisive diptych. And reflects how Rome-based musician Ondina, like the legendary hero Orpheus, is gripped by a need to look back at her lost love—sad, beautiful Alexia—across the gap of time. Euridice, Euridice is a realist tale told in a mythic mode, its mirrored love stories woven through with imagery of ceaseless ocean waves and an inauspicious snake slithering, of bathing women winding among one another like water nymphs. And of Alexia (Sarantopoulou) reaching towards Ondina (Quadri) from beyond the divide, coaxing Ondina closer to or away from Daria (Menichetti), who wishes to dance away with her arrested heart. Also in this prgoramme : LA RIVIÈRE ÉLISE LEVY | FRANCE | 2024 | 15 MIN | FRENCH EST One afternoon, three high school students sneak out of their all-girls Catholic boarding school. Sunny, the new girl, has gone for a swim in the river. Sarah is eager to join her, even though Clémence disapproves.

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During the summer, three friends meet on a wild Mediterranean island. Maxime is madly in love with Yann. Carried by this consuming desire, Maxime throws himself in an intense romantic quest, swaying between dream and reality, at the risk of losing himself.

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DUTCH • FRENCH ST | Capturing the recklessness of youth and the excitement of newfound sexual liberties in sensuous black-and-white cinematography, Dennis Alink’s Out offers up a vivid and tender tale of being young and gay. Tom (Bas Keizer, in a star-making performance) and Ajani (an effervescent Jefferson Yaw Frempong-Manson) are closeted secondary school sweethearts who yearn for life outside of their small-minded, rural community in the Netherlands. Their solution is Amsterdam, where the queer scene is thriving and they can work at their dreams of becoming filmmakers. Quickly falling into the Dutch capital’s gay nightlife offers the pair some initial thrills: cheeky games of Never Have I Ever, limo rides across the city, eye-opening trips to the bathhouse. But the challenges quickly follow, pushing them to separately question: “Who am I, and where do I fit in?” Recalling such classic monochromatic films about wayward youth as The Last Picture Show and Gus Van Sant’s Mala Noche, Alink and his queer collaborators present a lived-in, piercing portrait that proves coming out isn’t just a pronouncement of one’s sexuality, it’s a simultaneously joyous and heartbreaking journey of self-discovery.

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PART OF THE PROGRAMME: LA RÉVOLUTION DES COORDINATEURS D'INTIMITÉ (SEX IS COMEDY) On the set of a film, Anna, a 30-year-old stuntwoman, falls in love with the star she is body double for. Will Ana—who thought she was happy in her relationship—have the courage to come out of her heterosexual shell to confront this overwhelming desire?

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Fanny is a bookseller by day and a soft-hearted person the rest of the time. In love with her friend Louise and to repress the sadness of this impossible love, she has a series of one-night stands with uninteresting men. One evening, she invites Louise to a literary gathering she's hosting. Fanny may be about to have a bingo.

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An African musician meets a charming courtesan in a small French seaside town for a rare and secret moment of intimacy.

CompetitionDocumentary

In Sandi DuBowski’s crucial, decades-spanning documentary (executive produced by Darren Aronofsky), Rabbi Amichai Lau-Lavie takes on the Orthodox regime amid escalating reactions to his experimental spirit. It will take harrowing face-to-face confrontations, heated ideological conversations, and all the Radical Faerie magic he can muster to weather the onslaught. Part of a line of rabbis stretching back to the 11th century, at age 28 Amichai left his isolated, pressurized upbringing in Israel for the freedoms of late-90s New York. In America, he joined the Radical Faeries and tapped into the feminine divine with his Rebbetzin Hadassah Gross drag persona, finding redemption through transgression, and founding the God-optional congregation Lab/Shul. Still, he encounters a wall of tradition and the pull of his familial dynasty. Enrolling to become a rabbi at the Conservative-leaning Jewish Theological Seminary, he endeavours to change the system from the inside, but soon finds himself at odds with his peers and “co-conspirators,” defending laws he once broke. Will he have the stamina and willpower to remain true to his ideals, or will his lofty goals end up quelling his radical energy and all that he means to others?

Documentary

Tegan Quin (of Tegan and Sara fame) has been the victim of identity theft and an ongoing catfishing scam for over 15 years. While investigating, she shares for the first time how she was ensnared in toxic fan culture that revealed the dark side of fame. As one of the most influential queer indie rock bands of their generation, Tegan and Sara worked hard to cultivate an inclusive and passionate fanbase around the world. Fans were drawn to the duo’s beautifully confessional lyrics and found within the community a safe space be queer during a time when few bands would declare allyship, let alone celebrate their own queer identity. But Tegan and Sara’s world turned upside down when Tegan’s personal files were hacked in 2011 and weaponized by a bad actor in a complex catfish scheme to ensnare members of this community. Told through Tegan’s own voice, the voices of deceived fans, a trove of communications between fake Tegan and their victims, and the visual history of the band’s behind-the-scenes archive, this documentary feature is a thriller, a caper, a whodunnit, and an intimate personal journey rolled into one.

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FINNISH • ENGLISH ST | A 15-year-old Finnish girl—and her older incarnation—ponder the resemblance between first love and nuclear explosions under a sky heavy with Chernobyl clouds. Befriending a loner who seems radioactive to others, Mariia tries to keep their connection from melting down, basking in the light of devotion, however blinding. By-the-book Mariia (played at different ages by Rebekka Baer and Laura Birn) comes from a close-knit but struggling household, her mother affected by a mysterious cancer. Her situation is contrasted with that of self-possessed Mimi (Anni Iikkanen), whose home is blighted by alcoholism and neglect, its wallpaper peeling. But, swimming beneath crystalline surfaces and entwined in one another’s arms, they try to drown out the ills of the world. Crimped hair and oversized sweaters capturing the innocent 80s bubble Mariia thrives in and the euphoria Mimi strives to inhabit, despite the heaviness of experience. Guided by its source material, the 2011 novel by Vilja-Tuulia Huotarinen, and inflected with the shifting haze of ennui and energy that is a hallmark of Sofia Coppola’s star-dusted tragedies, Inari Niemi’s film is a tonally precise mood piece about girlhood in all its ominous, scintillating paradoxes.