As the end of a 24-year journey draws closer for the Out in Africa Gay and Lesbian Film Festival, film lovers and members of the LGBTIQ community will be treated to one final splendid selection of films hosted at Gallery University Stellenbosch (GUS).
The “Queer Bioscope” event encompasses the screenings of seven films, running over numerous months, which explore different aspects of queer identity. The first screening took place on the 30th of July with the screening of the previously banned and controversial film Inxeba: The Wound which drew a full house to the small and intimate screening room.
The controversial film Inxeba: The Wound was the first to be screened at the final Out in Africa Gay and Lesbian Film Festival and drew a full house of eager film watches of both the LGBTIQ and heterosexual communities. PHOTO: Creative Commons
The film festival is the brainchild of co-founders Nodi Murphy and Jack Lewis who have poured much of the last 24 years into the festival as an important space and event with regards to representation for the LGBTIQ community.
“We made people feel safe, a place to come out that was not a straight [heterosexual] space. This gave people the opportunity to meet people similar to themselves that may be going through the same things they are.
“I think we did our jobs. People in the LGBTIQ community now realise they have rights protecting them and I think issues surrounding sexuality are not as bad as they once were although they do definitely exist. It was great to create spaces within the cinema where people could get together and to realise that as a queer people they were not alone,” said Murphy.
The hosting of the final Out in Africa Gay and Lesbian Film Festival in Stellenbosch is also significant as the festival was traditionally hosted in Cape Town and Johannesburg with smaller satellite broadcasts in smaller and more obscure locations.
The logo of the Out in Africa Gay and Lesbian Film Festival which sadly comes to an end after the last screening at GUS. PHOTO: Out in Africa
“We used to bring in people from around a 150 km radius for the screenings in smaller locations such as Potchefstroom or Ermelo. These screenings were really important as access to safe spaces in these small towns are far harder to come by than in the big cities and for people in these communities coming out as gay or lesbian could be really difficult,” said Murphy.
The move to the screenings in Stellenbosch creates a space were members of the LGBTIQ community of the town can feel safe, something that is severely lacking.
“I do not think the university is doing enough. There used to be weekly safe spaces facilitated by Breaking Boxes at the transformation office of Stellenbosch University (SU) and these were widely advertised on Facebook, but these spaces do not exist anymore.
“I think the university should look into a dedicated Gender Studies course, it is a subject that invites people to think critically and starts a conversation around gender politics which is something that has not been expanded upon in depth in Stellenbosch yet,” said Rabia Abba Omar (22) a History Honours student at SU.
These sentiments were also shared by Carina Jansen (22) a graduate of the Visual Arts Department of SU. “The fact that you have to create a safe space means that the wider environment is not safe.” There are however also difficulties in establishing these safe spaces, “If you only have one type of safe space it is only ever going to be able to accommodate one type of person,” said Jansen.
Similarly, Omar feels that the framing of a safe space is important as, “a safe space is not safe for everyone.”
The full schedule for the seven films that will be shown at this year’s festival. PHOTO: Out in Africa
Despite these issues, the reception of the Out in Africa Gay and Lesbian Film Festival has been met with excitement in Stellenbosch.
“Film is one of the most important forms of representation for the LGBTIQ community. Maybe it is because we consume so much of it through television and movies. We shape so much of our perceptions about ourselves from what we see on television and in films that I think it can be used as an amazing tool to represent the Queer community to a far wider audience if it is done correctly,” said Jansen.
The next film being shown at the film festival is Beautiful Boxer which you can see the trailer for below: