The third festival day is buzzing with lively events and especially with our delightful premieres â 9 taking place only today! Weâve comprised a list of all the premieres and reruns scheduled for today to make your life easier. Check them out belowđ
As if that wasnât eventful enough, keep an eye out for our TEDDY Talk: The TEDDY Winners Path through a Pandemic. The event will be broadcasted live at 4 PM (CET) at teddyaward.tv/live.
Synopsis: The camera hovers, lost in reverie as voices and sounds waft through the gutted rooms of a building. Archive footage is sometimes projected onto unplastered walls and at others used as a soundtrack as we continue our tour. This is the legendary Chelsea Hotel, famous as the preferred abode of New Yorkâs bohemia from the 1950s to the 1980s. Here, bourgeois societyâs misfits â sex workers, poets, queers and artists â were able to find cheap accommodation and form alliances. In this documentary, the remaining tenants from that era grant access to their flats and give us an insight into their lives. They are the focus of a film that interweaves the present with the ghosts of the past. The completion of eight years of luxury refurbishment ahead of the buildingâs reopening as a hotel is eagerly awaited by some residents and dreaded by others.
Synopsis: James Gregory Atkinsonâs performative short film centers the history of the iconic Peacock Chair to interrogate contemporary social contexts and historical concepts of identities. The film engages the chairâs origins in forced prison labor in the Philippines, its status as an internationally traded âexoticâ commodity, its use in portrait photography, and its associations with Black radical activists such as Huey P. Newtonâto explore ideas of Black masculinities and resistance.
Synopsis: A remote lake in the North American landscape. The sand is yellow, the sky is blue and the mountains distant; there is nary a tree far and wide to provide shade. Faye is spending her days here in a trailer, with two books and a radio, leisurely birdwatching and stargazing. With her wiry build, wild blonde hair and hands that speak of a life of labour, she fits in perfectly here. Anything that breaks, she simply fixes; the only time she sits up and takes notice is when there is a knock at the door. Because Faye is waiting for Lito. Their connection goes way back to their youthful love for each other, but for some years now they have also shared the pain of loss â both are widowed. Max Walker-Silvermanâs gentle, laconic film is about contemplative introspection, the power of love and the depths of melancholy. Dale Dickeyâs portrayal of Faye is a touching mixture of inner strength and fragility, which is also reflected in the impressive natural scenery and a delicate soundtrack.
Synopsis: Four friends â Nic, Leo, Andrea and Raff â tell the stories of their gender transitions. Looking back on their childhood and youth, they share their personal memories and experiences. Even if they did not always conform to the social norms of femininity â all four were socialised as girls. Each of their gender biographies may be different, yet there are parallels. This helps them to understand each other and feel less alone. The discussions with partners, the choice of pronouns, the hormone therapy, decisions about surgery and dealing with the authorities â the processes are diverse, and lengthy. In the strictly binary world we live in, the decision to determine oneâs own gender identity is a subversive act.
Synopsis: In his dreams, bathed in a brilliant glow, Manu and his best friend Felipe are inching closer and closer together, yet they never kiss. A confusing desire, as Manu is dating Azul, and the two are about to have sex for the first time. In Mariano Biasinâs Sublime, a niggling desire simmers beneath the surface of 16-year-old Manuâs everyday life, his emotional turmoil bubbling up and revealing itself in indirect ways – during his attempt to find the right chords for his latest lyrics and in his flights of melancholic introspection, at band practices with the rest of the guys or during supper with his parents. Cautiously, with increasing resignation, Manu keeps trying to solve the conundrum: how do you avoid losing something precious, when itâs the very thing tearing you up inside?
Synopsis: While their classmates endure the visit to the concert with pranks, Pietro and Tommaso secretly get closer to each other in the box. During the playing of Vivaldiâs composition, their lips touch. When Tommaso invites Pietro to his home shortly afterwards, the tension is still in the air. The desire, however, soon gives way to an ambiguity that particularly irritates the otherwise cautious Pietro. What did the kiss mean?
Synopsis: A city at dawn. Traffic is flowing like red and white blood cells. A man sleeps, enveloped in the darkness â he is beautiful, he is naked, it is hot. We will never know what he is dreaming. The sun rises and the façades of the skyscrapers begin to sparkle
Synopsis: In the shadow of a colonial past and a neo-capitalist present, Inti, Jai and Pauline are searching for their place in a world that was not made for them. As they roam the neighbourhood looking for somewhere to settle, they question their parents about faith, spirituality, roots and their experiences of migration. They decide to occupy an empty bank building in order to fill it with their memories, dreams and role play. A portrait of our time that oscillates between documentary, performance art and surrealism.
Synopsis: A Hollywood villa on a sultry summer night. The escort does what he was hired to do and gives his client the illusion he has paid for. âIâll make you a starâ, the customer says, before the tide turns abruptly and the power dynamics are unsettled. A revenge movie of the queer kind.
The Berlinale Summer Special has finally arrived and what better time to celebrate our wonderful LGBTQ+ films and artists than during pride month! Starting today and running until the 20th of June 2021, all films nominated for a TEDDY 2021 will be screened in open-air cinemas around Berlin!
Breaking the ice on the first day of festival is the feature BLISS (original title: GLĂCK) directed by the wonderful Henrika Kull! Shot in a real brothel, the film breaks down the negative stereotypes and stigma associated with sex work through the passionate relationship of two female sex workers. More details about the film and other screening dates can be found on our BLOG. Watch the full interview with Henrika Kull here:
We just canât get enough of this buzzing festival atmosphere that was so dearly missed! Screening today is a delightful short film directed by Diogo Costa Amarante: A PRESENT LIGHT (original title: âLuz de Presençaâ). Save the dates: 09.06. / 21:45 / Freiluftkino Hasenheide 10.06. / 21:45 / Freiluftkino im Filmrauschpalast Donât miss out on the other screenings taking place today on our BLOG .Catch Amarante discussing his idea for the film on Vimeo:
Diogo Costa Amarante in conversation with Jan-Felix Wuttig
Over the course of two days and one night, as Lisa moves out of the apartment she has shared with Mara and into the one where she will live alone, many things will break and some will be repaired. Like the titular spiderâs web, the film has a perfect, fragile geometry. Set almost entirely in interiors, it is also an involuntary summary of the paradoxical age of the pandemic. The transition from one abode to another, and the energy that is released between one story ending and another beginning, puts the entire ensemble into an altered state of grace. …read more
âThey say when you get goosebumps, your soul touches your body.â
Itâs Masha, Iana and Seniaâs last but one year of high school. Among the thriving pot plants in the classroom and to the sound effects of a Biology lesson about physical signs of stress, the young protagonists grapple with themselves and with one another. 16-year-old Masha is the quiet center of Kateryna Gornostaiâs feature debut. …read more
The time has come: the program for the TEDDY Screenings 2021 is fixed! During the Berlinale Summer Special, from June 09 – June 20, 21, the screenings of the films nominated for the TEDDY AWARD will take place in different open air cinemas. The screening dates and cinema addresses can be found under the respective film descriptions.
An overview about the TEDDY AWARD 2021 film selection you can find on our website.
The TEDDY AWARD and the award donator HARALD CHRIST, entrepreneur and longtime TEDDY supporter, will present the TEDDY ACTIVIST AWARD for the first time this year. The award includes a donation of 5.000 ⏠and will be presented annually in the future in the scope of the TEDDY AWARD ceremony.
Inspired by the work and courage of so many activists who fight for the ongoing struggle of sexual and gender minorities all over the world, the TEDDY ACTIVIST AWARD honours people who work for change under difficult circumstances and in a non-supportive political and social environment and thus contribute to tolerance, acceptance, justice and equality in the world. In many parts of the world, this means putting oneself and the people around you at risk and exposing oneself to rejection, marginalization, isolation and persecution. The award is intended to honour the courage and determination of these people.
The TEDDY ACTIVIST AWARD 2020 goes to a group of activists who, at risk to their own lives, courageously and resolutely save and rescue persecuted homosexuals and transsexuals in Chechnya from imprisonment, torture and murder and bring them to safety. The TEDDY and Harald Christ pay tribute to these courageous people with deep respect and hope that this prize will help to ensure that the continuing silence and look away of the so-called “free world” finally turns into a worldwide outcry of indignation and that the perpetrators are ostracized and held accountable by the world community.
The Gay Pogrom in Chechnya:
On April 1, 2017, the Novaya Gazeta, an independent Russian newspaper, reported that government security officials were abducting, detaining, and torturing gay men in Chechnya, demanding that these men divulge the names of other gays whom they would then abduct, detain, and torture as well. Chechnyaâs President Ramzan Kadyrov has openly described the goal of this campaign as an effort âto cleanse our blood.â He has called upon family members to carry out so-called âhonor killings.â
There are no estimates of the number of the dead. Hundreds of Chechens have simply disappeared since the atrocities began, and hundreds more have escaped.
Leaders of the St. Petersburg-based Russian LGBTQI* Network established a hotline in the early days of the pogrom. They set up a series of secret safe-houses throughout the country, in partnership with other LGBTQI* organizations, especially The Moscow Community Center for LGBT+ Initiatives.
In the first two years, they moved 151 people out of the Chechnya and beyond the Russian border. Countries receiving them include Canada, Germany, France, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands, Argentina, and elsewhere. The US government rejected all applicants stemming from the pogrom.
Response from Chechen Leadership:
Ramzan Kadyrov immediately denied the accusations when they first surfaced, calling them âlies.â Whatâs more, hesays it is impossible to carry out such crimes because they âdonât have that kind of people here. We donât have gays.â Despite these statements, Kadyrov has publicly endorsed so-called âhonor killings,â urging families to murder relatives suspected of being gay, lesbian, or transgender. His press secretary stated: âIf there were such people in Chechnya, the law-enforcement agencies wouldnât need to have anything to do with them because their relatives would send them to a place of no return.â Those who commit such murders face no criminal ramifications. Russian President Vladimir Putin accepted Kadyrovâs denials. Yet under pressure from international leaders, Putin briefly moved forward with a widely criticized investigation, which found no witnesses and victims willing to give testimony, fearing retribution. The Kremlin claimed the lack of testimony was proof that no human rights abuses had occurred.
Lesbians and Transgender Women and Men are Also Targeted:
Although much of the reporting on this subject has focused on gay men, Chechen lesbians and transgender women have reported similar treatment. Survivors have commonly spoken about forced religious exorcisms and involuntary commitments to psychiatric hospitals, as well as torture and detention. Evidence has also surfaced of so-called âhonor killingsâ of lesbians.
Women have little autonomy in Chechnyaâs interpretation of Islam. Male family members generally accompany them when they are outside of their homes, making their efforts to escape to safety even more difficult â and dangerous â than for men.
The Victims are Being Hunted Around the World:
Since the operational goal of Kadyrovâs government is the elimination from the Chechen bloodline of LGBTQI people, fleeing the country doesnât give victims safety. Authorities pressure Chechen families to hunt them down and return them for execution. And their reach is surprisingly far. There is a vast global diaspora of people who fled during the two Chechnya wars.
In November 2019, officials called upon diaspora members to enforce Chechen mores wherever they live. In remarks widely seen as referring to gay people, Kadyrovâs right-hand man said: âI’m telling you, those who live in Europe, America and Canada: Stop such people! By law, with our traditions and customs, we should resolve their problem,â said Adam Delimkhanov. âWe implore you, donât let them embarrass the honor of our nation.â There have been cases of Chechens being tricked into returning or being forced in their new country to record denials of their homosexuality. Some have been attacked in their host countries.
Itâs Not a Good Time to be Gay in Much of the World:
The persecution of gay people is not exclusive to Chechnya. According to ILGA-Europe, there are 70 countries worldwide where being gay is criminalized, including 11 countries where the death penalty could be imposed.
However, what is happening in Chechnya is categorically different. It is the only government since Nazi Germany to round up LGBTQI people for extermination.
