2013: two prizes awarded
First prize: Taboo... Yardies, directed by Selena Blake
It’s not illegal to be gay in Jamaica but legal
sanction is the least of your worries. Jamaican society is profoundly and
murderously homophobic. This utterly compelling account of how ordinary LGBT
people exist under these conditions was filmed on the island itself.
Extraordinary stories of violence and the constant living in fear make for
sometimes uncomfortable viewing. Interview subjects tell of the casual and
relentless attacks; their faces are digitally obscured because there is nowhere
for an openly gay person to be safe on the island. The relationship between
dancehall culture and some of its notorious artists is well known. Using
interviews with a wide range of Jamaicans and leading cultural figures in
exile, this is a wide-ranging film which explores how Jamaica got to be this
way, and how some people are working for change.
Second prize: Intersexion, directed by Grant Lahood
One baby
in 2,000 is born with genitalia so ambiguous that no-one can tell if the child
is male or female. Mani Bruce Mitchell, New Zealand’s first ‘out’
intersex person, takes us on a journey to meet some of those people. Most of
the participants in Intersexion suffered numerous surgeries and treatments
since birth in an attempt to ‘fix’ them and make their bodies fit the
male/female binary. All now identify as neither male nor female. Their stories
are often heartbreaking, frequently hilarious but always eye-opening. A
powerful and important film which needs to be seen because, as Mani Bruce
Mitchell says, ‘I hope this documentary will show everyone that the ‘shame
and secrecy’ model hasn’t worked – and that intersex children can grow up
to make informed choices about their own bodies.’
In 1860,
under British colonial rule, Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code criminalised,
among other things, homosexuality. In July 2009 the Delhi High Court repealed
the clause in a landmark decision. Tulli, who graduated in South Asian Studies
and has worked on several activist projects in India and Europe, follows three
defiant Indian activists as they head to the first anniversary celebrations of
the scrapping of 377 and share their personal stories, experiences of fighting
the clause, and consider what a year of legalised homosexuality has brought.
In the summer of 2005, parents
of gay teenager Zach Stark packed their son off to Love In Action, an ex-gay
ministry purporting to cure gay youths of their homosexual desires. Documenting
the ordeal on his Myspace blog, word of Zach’s situation spread rapidly
throughout the community, and as a small group of protesters began to grow
outside the organisation, it was not long before the mainstream media showed an
interest in Zach’s story and began to question the damaging nature of
fundamentalist ex-gay programmes. Six years in the making, Morgan Jon Fox’s
passionate documentary chronicles one of the most controversial cases in recent
gay history, featuring interviews with the former director of Love In Action,
several ex-clients and Zach himself. Whilst undoubtedly a sad and often
shocking tale, this is ultimately a film about hope, celebrating the power of
the community to rally together and incite political change.
On 1st
April 2011, CHE announced the winner of this year's Derek Oyston Film Award as
Mutantes (Punk Porn Feminism). Ian Stewart, one of CHE's team of
judges, presented the cerfificate and the cheque for £2,000 to Nazmia Jamal,
to be passed on to the director, Virginie Despentes.
the judges, announced that
the runner-up is We Were Here, directed by David Weissman, a
heart-warming account of the San Francisco gay community’s early mobilisation
around the AIDS epidemic, at a time when treatments were unknown.
Following the showing of the film on 21st March 2010, the
certificate, and a cheque for £2,000 was presented by Griffith Vaughan
Williams, Secretary of CHE, to Nazmia Jamal, a programmer for the Film
Festival, to be passed on to the film's director, Mathilda Piehl.
