Getting Out, co-directed by Alexandra Chapman, Chris Dolan, and Daniel Neumann, is a documentary about three gay Africans seeking asylum because of the persecution they've experienced. Sadly, neither South Africa nor Europe turn out to be GLBT sanctuaries either.
In Waited For, Nerina Penzhorn's documentary about adoption in South Africa, her mixed-race, lesbian couple is told clearly that they're last in line after heterosexual, same race, same religion parents.
Glitterboys and Ganglands peeks behind the pink-veil preparations for Miss Gay Western Cape, directed by Arthur C. Clarke winning novelist Lauren Beukes (Zoo City).
Sheldon Larry's Leave It On the Floor has even more outrageous costumes than Glitterboys . Beyonce's musical director Kim Burse and Michael Jackson's choreographer Frank Gaston Jr. deliver some electrifying action and a crop of new queer musical anthems.
This year's selection can compete with any other festival on quality; a number of the films are stacking up accolades, including: Weekend, directed by Britain's Andrew Haigh; We Were Here, directed by Bill Weber and David Weissman, which chronicles the beginnings of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in San Francisco in the 1980s; Jon Garano and Jose Maria Goenaga's For 80 Days is an exquisite story of second chances about two sexagenarians who meet over the hospital beds of their sick relations and rekindle a relationship after 50 years; Kareem J. Mortimer's Children of God, a tale of forbidden love and an exploration of the influence of conservative Christianity's influence in The Bahamas; Jonathan Lisecki's Gayby, a comedy short about a straight woman who wants to have a baby with her gay ex-college housemate; and Laura Neri was named best director at The LA Femme Film Festival last year for Kill The Habit, an offbeat black comedy about three women trying to get rid of the body of a dead drug dealer.
Of course, since all OIA films have an 18-age restriction regardless of content, there has to be one which earns it: François Sagat, a famous French porn star, takes a serious role in Man At Bath, a revealing (in all ways) look at the end of a relationship and the two men's different ways of coping.
Tickets are R47 in Joburg and R42 in Cape Town, but there are lots of concessions available: Clicks, Metropolitan, OAPs and half-price Wednesdays.
