FEATURES
The Features program this year showcases a curated selection of films majorly documentaries, that explore LGBTQIA+ lives across the globe. These films delve into themes of identity, love, resistance, and belonging, reflecting both local and global queer experiences. The program creates space for nuanced narratives that challenge norms and celebrate the complexity of queer lives.
Queer As Punk
Yihwen Chen | Malaysia | English | 89 mins | Documentary
15 January, 1:30 – 3:00, Airavat Picture House
21 January, 4:45- 6:15, Airavat Picture House
Faris is the transman lead singer of an openly queer punk band ‘Shh..Diam!’ in Malaysia. Together with his bandmates Yon and Yoyo, they use their music to fight for LGBTQI+ rights in a country where human rights and freedom of expression is severely curtailed by a conservative Muslim society. Faced with increasing discrimination, Yoyo decides to leave Malaysia. Despite the challenges, Faris chooses to stay, determined to continue using their music as a platform for advocating for freedom and equality, refusing to let the pressures of society silence their voice.
Previously screened at: Berlinale 2025
Director’s Bio:
Yiwen Chen is a Malaysian documentary filmmaker and journalist. Her body of work primarily focuses on human rights, social issues and gender equality, politics and environmental justice.
My Chest is Full of Sparks
Gal S. Castellanos | Mexico, Turkey | Spanish | 75 mins | Documentary
15 January, 5:30 – 6:45, Airavat Picture House
22 January, 5:15 – 6:30, Airavat Picture House
In this personal documentary, the director, Gal S. Castellanos, turns the camera towards his family after his father’s death. Days later, his mother escapes to Turkey to meet her secret Facebook lover. Mother and Gal, then communicate through video letters. These video correspondences reveal their attempts to see each other through a journey of self-discovery. The mother who gave up singing for motherhood, finds freedom away from home for the first time; and the director, in solitude, decides to transition genders in the midst of making this film.
Previously screened at: Vancouver Latin American Film Festival, MixBrasil Festival
Director’s Bio:
Gal S. Castellanos is a writer, director, and singer. An observer of everyday life and practitioner of ‘cinema of the ordinary’. My Chest Is Full of Sparks is his debut documentary.
Warm Film
Dragan Jovićević | Serbia | 90 mins | Serbian | Experimental Documentary
16 January, 1:30 – 3:00, Airavat Picture House
When a Serbian tabloid attacks the production for making the film with a potential queer subject, the two young actors start exploring the topic of representation of LGBTIQ characters through the history of Yugoslav and later Serbian cinema, but also the social circumstances that have resulted in different treatments of these characters. The film digs deep what the presence of queers in cinema actually meant through the decades.
Previously screened at: Thessaloniki Documentary International Festival, KASHISH Pride Film Festival
Director’s Bio:
Dragan Jovićević is an accomplished filmmaker and visual artist who has won 8 awards for this film and was nominated for best director at OFN LGBTQAI+ Film Festival.
Being Mikolaj
Aurelia Frydrych-Zdanowska | Poland | 57 mins | Polish | Documentary
16 January, 5:45 – 6:45, Airavat Picture House
19 January, Blue Diamond Society (BDS)
In this coming-of-age film Mikołaj enters adulthood, and begins the fight for his future. Mikołaj faces typical challenges of youth, securing the first job, magic of first love, but also needs to confront the Kafkaesque judicial system that does not recognise his gender identity. But to keep fighting for justice, he must first reconcile with his father, Piotr. Will they be able to find common ground and grow up together? Can a simple conversation on a bench help avoid the greatest tragedy?
Previously screened at: Watch Docs, Polish Docs
Director’s Bio:
An award-winning National Geographic documentary director, Aurelia Frydrych-Zdanowska is also a photographer who blends diverse visual media.
Beyond the Blues
Debalina Majumder | India | 63 mins | Bengali | Documentary
17 January, 11:00 – 1:40, Airavat Picture House
17 January, Blue Diamond Society
Following Neel’s journey from an Assigned Female at Birth (AFAB) person to a feminist non-masculinist transman, the documentary tells a story of breaking heteronormative gender roles, challenging transnormative stereotypes and revisiting queer feminist aspirations. The film explores identity and masculinity across two generations shaped by patriarchal norms. It touches upon citizenship challenges, while offering a rare and vital portrait of transmasculine lives in India that are often rendered invisible. It is a story that affirms resilience, hope, and the possibility of change.
Previously screened at: International Documentary and Short Film Festival of Kerala (IDSFFK), Kolkata People’s Film Festival
Director’s Bio:
Debalina Majumder is an award-winning independent filmmaker and cinematographer, a Berlinale Talent and Global Media Maker Fellow, working primarily in community-funded films.
Everything Needs To Live
Tetyana Dorodnytsina, Andrii Lytvynenko | Poland | 70 mins | Russian, Ukrainian | Documentary
17 January, 5:15 – 6:30, Airavat Picture House
20 January, BDS
Everything Needs to Live portrays the unusual daily life of Anna Kurkurina, a charismatic athlete, ‘the strongest woman in the world’, an animal activist and an out lesbian. At the age of forty, she decided to pursue a career as a powerlifter and soon made it to the top by becoming a triple world champion. Since the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, Anna has been using the power of her popularity to help injured and abandoned animals.
Previously screened at: Krakow film festival, Docudays Film Festival, Verzio Film Festival
Director’s Bio:
Tetyana Dorodnytsina is a Film director, editor and visual artist with experience in television channels, production companies and Kyivtelefilm film studio and participation in major Doc labs.
Andrii Lytvynenko is a Ukrainian film director and producer known for award-winning documentaries including Askania Reserve (2019), Fantastic Ukrainians. Fine Art (2020), and Euromaidan.
Come Out of Ghetto
Kevin Harry Schwarzstein | Germany | 65 mins | German | Documentary
17 January, 2:00 – 3:05, Alliance Francaise Kathmandu (AFK)
Founded in Hamburg in the 1970s, the gay theater “Brühwarm” toured Germany with its musical cabaret. Founding member Corny Littmann wrote the lyrics and Rio Reiser (“Ton Steine Scherben”) provided the music. The result was a new form of theater as a political tool. In the documentary, former members of the theater have their say and give an impressive account of how the theater group, with its emancipatory and political aspirations, fought for gay rights in the turbulent political times of the 1970s.
Previously screened at: Hamburg International Queer Film Festival
Director’s Bio:
Kevin Köhrmann is a Berlin-based director, documentary filmmaker, and journalist whose work explores queer history, cultural movements, and questions of visibility and memory.
Romantic Chorus
Jeff M. Giordano | United States, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Spain, United Kingdom | English | 85 mins | Animation, Documentary
17 January, 2:30 – 3:30, AFK
Romantic chorus is an animated feature-length documentary brought together by collaboration of production staff and 17 animators from around the world. The filM focuses on sexuality and romantic connections featuring 21 diverse interviews from a wide range of genders, cultural backgrounds, abilities, and sexual orientations as they discuss sex, monogamy/polyamory, fear and technology.
Previously at: Melbourne International Animation Festival
Director’s Bio:
Jeff has directed multiple, award-winning motion pictures that have been presented at major film festivals across the globe like the Roma Cinema DOC, DOCUDAYS and others.
About Last Year
Beatrice Surano, Dunja Lavecchia, Morena Terranova | Italy | 78 mins | Italian | Documentary
17 January, 5:40 – 7:40, AFK
Celeste, Giorgia and Letizia are three young women as different as they are linked by an awareness: as cisgender women, they are guests in the ballroom world. And yet, it is precisely here that they have found a safe space where they can be masters of their own bodies without judgment, prejudices or provocation. Here, to the irresistible rhythm of performance and dance, they have become sisters.Now that many novelties are approaching, they are about to embark on a journey that will make them grow and reflect on the choices they must make for their future.
Previously screened at: The Venice International Film Critics’ Week, Festival di Cinema e Donne di Firenze, Premio Libero Bizzarri Festival
Director’s Bio:
Dunja Lavecchia, Beatrice Surano and Morena Terranova are long-time friends. Passionate about cinema of the real, in 2017 they founded an association to discuss cultural and social themes, in particular related to gender and sexuality.
Under the Moonlight
Tonny Trimarsanto | Indonesia | Indonesian | 87 mins | Documentary
18 January, 1:30 – 3:00, Airavat Picture House
At an Islamic school in Yogyakarta, all the adult students are transgender. Here, the community lives, works, prays, and supports one another in ways they choose, a complete contradiction compared to the world outside the territories of the school. Seeing life through the eyes of Nur, a transgender person, we witness the violence faced by the transgender community. Through everyday moments of cooking, worshiping, singing, and laughter, the film captures the resilience, joy, and dignity of the community as they navigate life under the shadow cast by the external prejudice.
Previously at: IDFA Amsterdam, Queer East, Forum Film Dokumenter
Director’s Bio:
Tonny Trimarsanto is a filmmaker who has worked at different capacities of director, producer and screenwriter.
Interpreting Erik
Donald D’Haene | Canada | 58 mins | English | Documentary
18 January, 5:05 – 6:10, Airavat Picture House
Interpreting Erik is a family documentary that tells the story of Erik, life-long displaced & oh-so-talented family member while intertwining with the family’s journey after his death. Through the loss of one of their own, the film urges us to see people experiencing homelessness not as an end result, but as individuals who were once beautiful, creative, gifted, and deeply loved– people like us. Humans. Erik was not nothing; he was everything.
Previously screened at: New York International Film Awards, Twilight Tokyo Film Festival, Swedish International Film Festival (SIFF), Hong Kong International Film Carnival
Director’s Bio:
Donald D’Haene is an LGBTQ Canadian filmmaker. He has worked in the entertainment industry at different capacities as actor, singer, director, playwright, producer, TV presenter, a talk show host and editor.
Turn Around
Jiamin Hu | China | 70 mins | English, Mandarin Chinese | Documentary
19 January, 2:45 – 4:15, Airavat Picture House
Turn Around is a documentary about bodies, institutions, and the ethics of looking. The film follows Kane as they undergo gender affirmation surgery at Shanghai’s Hospital, entering the operating room and recovery ward to quietly observe an experience that is both deeply intimate and highly institutionalised. In moments of waiting and transition, the body turns tentatively and insistently, while its relationship to the world is gradually reshaped. Eschewing narrative resolution or dramatization, the film employs a restrained visual language to pose ongoing questions about documentary ethics and the politics of seeing.
Director’s Bio:
Jiamin Hu is a moving image artist and curator whose research focuses on queer cinema. Using metaphorically charged imagery, her works uncover the politics of identity and the performance of gender within public spheres.
The Queen of Amazonas
John Agudelo | Colombia | 90 mins | Spanish | Documentary
19 January, 5:45 – 7:15, Airavat Picture House
In the Amazonian border shared between Colombia, Peru, and Brazil, an indigenous trans beauty pageant is born that challenges age-old prejudices. Saray, Ariadna, and Ashley– trans girls belonging to different ethnicities, travel to Leticia to compete for the coveted crown. Between rehearsals, reflections, and painful memories, their fight to be crowned ‘The Queen of Amazonas’ becomes a political act of resistance providing an intimate portrait of the infinite diversity that flourishes in the Amazon.
Director’s Bio:
With over 15 years of experience, John Agudelo is an award-winning director, screenwriter and editor whose works have been screened and awarded at major film festivals around the world.
Floating Weed
Mohamed Ghanem | France | 59 mins | Japanese | Documentary
20 January, 1:30 – 2:45, Airavat Picture House
Famous for playing onnagata (female roles), Tachibana Daigorô is a star of taishû engeki. A distant cousin of kabuki, this popular travelling theatre is, however, a genre less recognized in Japan.”Floating Weed” is a dive into Daigorô’s wandering life fully dedicated to his craft and his audience.Through this immersion into the daily life of an actor who lives totally for his art, performing constantly, both on stage and in life, this film also interrogates some aspects of Daigoro’s intimate life.
Previously screened at: Tokyo Documentary Film Festival, Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema, Pärnu International Documentary Film Festival
Director’s Bio:
Mohamed Ghanem is a Fulbright alumnus who studied photography and documentary filmmaking. He works in theatre and film as a writer, actor, translator, and interpreter.
On the Path to Leo
Ana Bárcenas Torres | Italy, Mexico | 90 mins | Italian, Spanish | Documentary
20 January, 5:15- 6:45, Airavat Picture House
At 17 years old, Leo begins his gender transition. A journey that challenges his mother Ana (the director) to confront her own fears and prejudices as she walks beside her son while he embraces his true identity. Using the archival material, videos and family photos, the documentary portrays an intimate perspective of parents on coming to terms with a child’s gender transition. Originally titled ‘En camino a Leo’ received PROCINE and FOCINE grants and was showcased at Visions du Réel Film Market in 2025.
Previously screened at: 20º DOCS MX · Festival Internacional de Cine Documental de la Ciudad de México, 28° Festival Internacional de Cine de Punta del Este, 3º Kampala Slum Mobile Cinema Festival
Director’s Bio:
Ana Bárcenas Torres is a Literature graduate from UNAM with a Master’s in Documentary Film.
Her award-winning documentaries have competed and been recognised at major festivals.
Mixed↑ (MixedUp)
HAUI aka Howard J Davis | Canada | English | 76 mins | Art Documentary
21 January, 1:30 – 2:50, Airavat Picture House
Part testimonial/part confessional, Mixed↑ explores the lines between the facts of who one is and the fiction of what one can become. Mixed↑ follows Howard J Davis aka Haui, the filmmaker, as he combats the isolation of being BIPOC (Black Indigenous People of Color) and LGTBQ+ and helps to normalise the existence of being “other”. Co-produced by trans filmmaker/producer Jack Fox, Mixed↑ demands that we celebrate the beauty of being unique without negating the struggle of finding inner cohesion.
Previously screened at: Image+Nation LGBTQ Queer Film Festival, ByBlacks Peoples Choice Award, Seattle Queer Film Festival
Director’s Bio:
HAUI (Howard J. Davis) is an award-winning multidisciplinary artist creating cross-disciplinary work for stage, screen, and visual arts.
Velvet Vision
Bart Everly | United States | 98 mins | English | Documentary
22 January, 2:00 – 3:40, Airavat Picture House
Velvet Vision tells the story of photographer and filmmaker James Bidgood, whose 1960s beefcake photographs and the cult film Pink Narcissus redefined fantasy and erotic imagery whose work remained anonymous for decades. The film follows Bidgood as he returns to shooting after a forty-year long hiatus, exploring his past as a window dresser, drag artist, and costume designer, while revealing the struggles of an outsider using art and fantasy to navigate societal rejection. The documentary premiered at the Honolulu Rainbow Film Festival and Revelation Perth International Film Festival.
Previously screened at: Honolulu Rainbow Film Festival, Revelation Perth International Film Festival, Outsouth Queer Film festival, Oslo/ Fusion International Film Festival
Director’s Bio:
Bart Everly is an award-winning American filmmaker and photographer. His films and photographs document art and culture, society, and politics.
TransUniversal
Rafael Robles Gutiérrez (Rafatal) | Spain | 80 mins | Spanish | Documentary
23 January, 2:00 – 3:20, Airavat Picture House
TransUniversal traces a journey through the history of the struggle for the recognition of trans people’s human rights. The documentary shows how the fight for equal rights, to which all are entitled by birth, has never been easy and remains unresolved in the case of trans people. In Spain, the still-unapproved Trans Law stands as a flame of hope for those facing exclusion, limited opportunities, and social rejection. TransUniversal maps the current state of affairs across historical, cultural, media, cinematic, and television contexts, but above all, the social one.
Previously screened at: Festival de Málaga
Director’s Bio:
Rafael Robles Gutiérrez, also known as Rafatal, is a Spanish screenwriter, director, producer, and audiovisual educator.
Swimming Against the Current
Melika Shafahi | Canada | 52 mins | Persian | Documentary
23 January, 6:05 – 7:00, Airavat Picture House
Swimming Against the Current is a poetic documentary tracing the emotional journey of Javid, an Iranian drag queen navigating life in Toronto. Filmed over two and a half years, the film captures Javid’s reflections on migration, identity, and the courage it takes to start anew. Through both quiet routines and vibrant performances, the film reveals what it means to swim against the current and live one’s truth out loud. Swimming Against the Current is a story of transformation, resilience, and the brave act of living authentically, against all odds.
Previously screened at: Mystic Film Festival 2022, American Black Film Festival
Director’s Bio:
Melika Shafahi is an Iranian-born photographer and filmmaker.Drawing on her Iranian-French heritage, her work explores displacement, identity, and the tension between reality and artifice.
Playing Around
Daniele Ambrosini | Italy | 85 mins | Italian | Documentary
24 January, 11:30 – 12:05, Airavat Picture House
After years, an old handycam gets picked up. This pick leads to a journey through childhood memories. A long series of homemade movies shot by the director and his friends in their formative years can be seen. Exploring its legacy, the director dives deep into his relationships with the people around him and how it developed his personal growth. This coming of age documentary is an ode to children with cameras who dared to create cinema without any rules, driven by sheer passion alone.
Previously screened at: Lift-Off Global Network First Time Filmmakers Sessions
Director’s Bio:
Daniele Ambrosini, a documentary student at CSC Palermo, is an emerging filmmaker who was selected for the Ji.hlava Academy in 2022.
Moirai
Bo Zhou | China | 83 mins | 2025 | Chinese | Documentary
24 January, 12:00 – 1:15, Airavat Picture House, Hall B
What begins as a quiet, private film about the slow transformation of a rural Chinese family takes an unexpected turn when the director is injured in a car accident—pushing him from behind the camera into the center of his own story. The accident cracks open another truth: the director is gay. In a world where rural women are invisible in public life and queer people are invisible in private life, their silences begin to speak to each other.Moirai is at once an intimate family portrait, a meditation on tradition, and a quiet revolution.
Call Me Agnes
Daniel Donato | Netherlands | Dutch, English, Indonesian, Portuguese | 94 mins | Fiction Documentary
24 January, 3:30 – 5:05, Airavat Picture House
Agnes’ life revolves around playing badminton with her queer friends and working at a restaurant she set up inside her house with her best friend Rini. One day her younger brother Indra arrives, looking for his brother Hans. Agnes faces a dilemma, keep the lie or tell the truth about who she is. The truth could give her a chance to reconcile with her brother but it seems more difficult to reach than she thought. Agnes relives and re-acts her memories and life experiences in a mix between fiction, musical and real life.
Previously screened at: Nederlands Film festival, LGBT + Film Festival Poland, XPOSED Queer Film festival Berlin
Director’s Bio:
Daniel Donato is a Brazilian director and cinematographer whose directing work premiered at Visions du Réel and has screened at major international festivals including Locarno and DOK Leipzig.
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