A Fantastic Woman
It seems that for two years running we've got our fingers on the pulse of the people, but a feel for the official winners, not so much. Last year, Olivier Ducastel and Jacques Martineau's excellent Théo et Hugo dans le même bateau (Paris 05:59) was our fave for the Ralf König-designed statuette, while this year, we professed our love for Francis Lee's English countryside masterpiece God's Own Country. The French boys took home the audience award last year and Lee's film took home the Männer magazine reader award this year. But that's fine, we like it here with people. And kudos to those readers who made sure Lee got a proper nod and congratulations to Lee himself for the award.
But all in all, the awards were a delightful and mixed bunch, not heavily leaning too much on either Western stories or cis-gay men. To reference Francis Lee once more, "It's an incredible time for queer stories," whether being queer is as edgy as it has been in the past or not.
Best feature winner A Fantastic Woman, from 2013 Berlinale-acclaimed director Sebastián Lelio (Gloria), rejuvenated our film editor's faith in the Competition this year, telling the tale of young Chilean trans woman whose lover suddenly dies. The trailer itself will hook more than just an LGBTQ crowd, setting it up to look like it follows familiar thriller ground, but I'm still keen on it.
Lia Hietala's "My Gay Sister" took home best short for its depiction of Swedish siblings of colour, one lesbian, the other, not quite sure...
The Special Jury Award thankfully went to to the impossibly irresistable Close-Knit from Japanese director Naoko Ogigami. Obviously the jury was as charmed as this blogger (as well as others on our team) by the straightforward, touching and at times funny narrative about an abandoned little girl and her adoptive carers – one a transwoman. Never has this die-hard debaucherous Berliner, railed so hard for a happy family to come out on top in the end. Don't miss!
The only confounding win was the Teddy for Best Documentary, Small Talk, falling in line with an impressively diverse winning selection, both by with gender and culture, it, for me at least, doesn't hold up cinematically to what I've seen. The family portrait documentary may have been worth it for a peak into the LGBT lives in Taiwan, but for that it needed a compelling character and storyline, and it just failed to strike a chord with me, while the other two nominees, Chavela and I Am Not Your Negro, still worked well promoting diversity, and seemed like infinitely more interesting studies for the screen.
The doco win as a bit boring aside, the totality of this year's Teddys captured a diversity of stories and perspectives, having me look forward to relevant queer cinema for years to come.