Each year, the Sarasota Film Festival presents a line-up of independent films that feature significant LGBTQ characters or themes. SarasotaOUT.com is excited to be teaming up with the Sarasota Film Festival to spotlight these features in our Gay Guide to the Sarasota Film Festival. Below you will find our curated list of films, special events and the hottest parties that cater to the LGBTQ community during the film festival's 20th anniversary!
What to Watch: Features
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CicadaAfter a string of unsuccessful and awkward encounters with women, Ben goes “back on the dick” (as his sister enthusiastically exclaims). CICADA follows Ben as he comes out to the world and develops an intense relationship with Sam, a man of color struggling with deep wounds of his own. As the summer progresses and their intimacy grows, Ben ultimately gains the strength to face a childhood trauma he has long suppressed.
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No Ordinary ManThe legacy of Billy Tipton, a 20th-century American jazz musician and trans icon, is brought to life by a diverse group of contemporary trans artists. Tipton gained fame as a musician throughout the United States in the 1940s and ’50s, but his trans identity was not known throughout the echelons of the jazz and pop worlds, and it wasn’t revealed publicly until after his death in 1989. Aisling Chin-Yee and Chase Joynt’s brilliantly crafted doc maps out Tipton’s undeniable legacy, while examining the disgraceful media scrutiny and questions of legitimacy his family endured after his death.
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PS Burn This Letter★ SarasotaOUT.com Staff Pick
A box of letters, held in secret for nearly 60 years, ignites a 5-year exploration into a part of LGBTQ history that has never been told.The letters, written in the 1950s by a group of New York City drag queens, open a window into a forgotten world where being yourself meant breaking the law. This astounding film reconstructs this pre-Stonewall era as nine former drag queens, now in their 80s and 90s, reveal how they survived and even flourished against all odds.
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What to Watch: Short Films
