Pushing the Festival up by 1 day to begin on a Wednesday and end on Pink Saturday, Frameline47 officially began its program at the Castro Theatre with a free screening of the restoration of Lucy Winer’s Greetings from Washington, D.C., which was Frameline's very first Castro Theatre screening back in 1981. This was one of the 47 programs scheduled at the Castro this year. Frameline47 opened with Andrew Durham’s adaptation of Alyssa Abbott’s memoir Fairyland, produced by Sofia Coppola and set in SF during the 1970s and 1980s. Following the sold out screening, Durham and author Abbott were joined by actors Bella Murphy and Nessa Dougherty for a magnificent onstage Q&A.
The Festival made big strides toward having a major presence in the East Bay this year, marking the Festival's first Oakland Opening Night film (the world premiere of Jac Cron’s Chestnut), Oakland Centerpiece film (Hannah Pearl Utt’s Cora Bora), and even an Oakland party at the new queer space Fluid510. Frameline47 also introduced two new program strands to honor and highlight SF's neighborhood cinemas. Neighborhood Nights showcased three retrospective titles at the 4 Star, Balboa, and Vogue Theatres. Erotic Evenings paid tribute to the Festival's longest-running venue partner, The Roxie, and its history as a porn theatre with three nights of steamy programming.
In addition to the Oakland Centerpiece film Cora Bora, FL47 had three additional Centerpiece films: Molly Gordon & Nick Lieberman’s Theater Camp for US Narratives, Frauke Finsterwalder's Sisi & I for World Cinema Narratives, and Tünde Skovrán’s Who I Am Not for Documentaries.
Among the Festival highlights: a sold-out Castro Theatre showing of Emma Seligman's instant classic Bottoms; Drag Race star Alaska onstage for God Save the Queens before performing at the FL47 Pride Kick-Off Party at Oasis; Taylor Mac and directors Rob Epstein & Jeffrey Friedman at Taylor Mac’s 24-Decade History of Popular Music, the final screening of the Festival; and Nigerian director Babatunde Apalowo accepting the second annual Out in the Silence Award for All the Colours of the World Are Between Black and White.
Festival info:
- Frameline47 had an attendance of 55,000.
- Read the launch press release, Colin Higgins Awards release, and the closing press release.
- View photos from Frameline47 here.
- Watch the Frameline47 trailer here.
Awards:
- Outstanding First Narrative Feature: 20,000 Species of Bees
- Honorable Mention: Big Boys
- Outstanding Documentary Feature: Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project
- Honorable Mention: Every Body
- Outstanding Narrative Short: The Cutest and Funniest Animals in the World
- Outstanding Documentary Short: Ob scene
- Audience Award for Narrative Feature: The Origin of Evil
- Audience Award for Documentary Feature: Who I Am Not
- Out in the Silence Award: All the Colours of the World Are Between Black and White
Off Season Screenings:
- Problemista
- Cassandro
- Dicks: The Musical
- She Is Conann
- Nyad
- Rustin
- The Persian Version
- Saltburn
- All of Us Strangers
- Beyond the Aggressives: 25 Years Later
- Fame
- Drive Away Dolls
- Love Lies Bleeding
- Housekeeping for Beginners
- Wicked Little Letters
- I Saw the TV Glow