Six of the best new LGBTQ+ short films from around the world

Inclu­sion, tol­er­ance and defi­ance were the self-stat­ed aims of this year’s Iris Prize Film Fes­ti­val in Cardiff, a per­spec­tive- and genre-span­ning show­case of queer cin­e­ma that con­sti­tutes keen prac­tice of the prin­ci­ples the fes­ti­val has preached en route to becom­ing the world’s largest LGBTQ+ short film prize. In this 50-strong slate – 36 films com­pet­ing for the £30,000 top prize, 15 com­pris­ing the Best British Short side­bar, and one crossover – Iris’ 13^th edi­tion brought to bear a cross-con­ti­nen­tal con­sid­er­a­tion of the con­tem­po­rary queer expe­ri­ence. Here are six stand­outs show­ing new direc­tions in its cin­e­mat­ic expressions.

Alfie Dale’s endear­ing effort in mag­ic real­ism earned the unprece­dent­ed hon­our of scoop­ing the Best British Short prize along­side the category’s audi­ence and youth jury awards. That triple-crown glo­ry is an apt indi­ca­tion of this sen­si­tive portrait’s like­ly crossover appeal: a ten­der out­look on child­hood inno­cence and uncon­di­tion­al love, it’s told from the per­spec­tive of a sev­en year old as his old­er sib­ling comes out as trans­gen­der. Expe­ri­enced in the depic­tion of mar­gin­alised com­mu­ni­ties from a pri­or short set among the Roma com­mu­ni­ty, Dale – him­self cis – took care to cast a trans actor in the lead role and worked exten­sive­ly with char­i­ty Mer­maids to ensure a faith­ful por­trait of trans youth expe­ri­ence. The result is a gor­geous short as stead­fast in its rep­re­sen­ta­tive resolve as it is sin­gu­lar in its empa­thet­ic importance.

In a wider film cul­ture ever awash in the con­tro­ver­sies of cast­ing cis actors in trans roles, Iris’ core com­mit­ment to inclu­sive rep­re­sen­ta­tion is a wel­come vision of the world as it should be. Yet new­er ground was bro­ken here with Pony­boi, tipped as the first nar­ra­tive film direct­ed by and star­ring an inter­sex actor. Riv­er Gal­lo offers a dynam­ic dis­play of vital­i­ty and vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty as the epony­mous sex work­er, as his direc­tion (with Sadé Clack­en Joseph) invokes west­ern and road movie tropes to gen­tly under­mi­nine gen­der arche­types in those most Amer­i­can gen­res. It’s a con­vinc­ing proof-of-con­cept toward a planned fea­ture expan­sion; with co-pro­duc­tion cred­its here for Emma Thomp­son and Stephen Fry, Gal­lo seems set to repeat that first dis­tinc­tion at full-length.

The queer­ing of genre is crit­i­cal, too, in David Velduque’s Cro­nen­ber­gian chiller, ample evi­dence of his expe­ri­ence in com­mer­cials and short films to date. Capa­bly drift­ing from the heat of a hook-up to hand­held hor­ror via his rig­or­ous visu­al con­trol, this vis­cer­al work thrives on atmos­pher­ic ver­sa­til­i­ty to deliv­er a con­cise and cut­ting take on sero­pho­bic self-loathing. But the fears under­ly­ing Stig­ma are far more than ghet­toed gay con­cerns: its remark­able impact is in build­ing on its frank queer sex sce­nario to devel­op a broad­ly res­o­nant por­trait of the prej­u­dices and hang-ups that deny us con­nec­tion, in express­ing with its well-exe­cut­ed body hor­ror squirms the uni­ver­sal­ly-felt pain and iso­la­tion of being held apart.

Whether cast­ing aside tragedy tropes that once came as inevitable or bring­ing to screen the erst­while under­seen, these shorts as a whole present a com­mu­ni­ty increas­ing­ly intent on being seen in its own terms. Tak­ing that to trans­gres­sive extremes with a trail of dropped jaws assured in its wake, Gram­my-nom­i­nat­ed music video direc­tor David Wilson’s Deep Clean puts to film an auda­cious per­for­mance piece by Har­ry Clay­ton-Wright. With a colour palette and set design that ges­tures to the not-so-dis­tant days of Sirkian nose-tap­ping and hap­pi­ly thinks fuck that, this tru­ly stun­ning short might com­prise film history’s most inti­mate use of a house­hold appli­ance. Brac­ing in its defi­ant recla­ma­tion of screen cabaret’s queer­ness, Deep Clean is a work of legit­i­mate­ly rad­i­cal power.

From queer recla­ma­tion of domes­tic space to queer­ness as nation­al threat in Xin­di Lou’s ener­getic tale of Chi­nese con­for­mi­ty and youth in rebel­lion. Dynam­i­cal­ly shot with satir­ic and styl­is­tic aban­don, boast­ing the scale of an epic in the slimmed-down shell of a short, How to Live Your Life Cor­rect­ly delights in its affect­ing nascent les­bian love sto­ry set against the back­drop of rig­or­ous social con­trol. Lou’s assured use of colour and an eye for spa­tial com­po­si­tion con­trast with a flar­ing sur­re­al­is­tic edge for a satire light on its feet and lin­ger­ing in its effect. In its nim­ble cri­tique of state-spon­sored oth­er­ing, it finds defi­ant force as an object of dis­sent – like the best of this year’s Iris offer­ings, meet­ing an oppres­sive gaze with its own steely-eyed stare.

It’s part­ly in the implic­it con­trast of wide­ly-diver­gent rights for LGBT+ com­mu­ni­ties world­wide that Deep Clean’s uncom­pro­mis­ing flaunt­ing of free­doms not uni­ver­sal­ly avail­able derives impact. That’s a link more intent­ly evoked in Jared Watmuff’s dis­arm­ing­ly fun­ny Hey You. A mul­ti-hyphen­ate helmer with teeth cut in micro-length shorts, Wat­muff dis­tin­guish­es him­self here pri­mar­i­ly in the edit: his movie is mer­ci­less­ly con­cise and match-cut to per­fec­tion, visu­al­ly con­vey­ing the ten­sion of an app hookup in the mak­ing with a deft for­mal con­trol that marks him one to watch close­ly. Its slow and then sud­den reveal is an immense achieve­ment of pac­ing, man­ag­ing in its four most­ly dia­logue-free min­utes a build-up of assured­ly cin­e­mat­ic skill.

For more on this year’s Iris Prize vis­it irisprize​.org