Imperfectu Film Festival: How Had I NOT Found This Before!
"Dissolving Borders, Queering Reality!
Being the type of person with a wide variety of interests, I often miss phenomenal projects while enthralled elsewhere. For quite a while I've had any media that touches on gender identity or provides some glimpse of transgender life, on my radar, including Orange is the New Black, Transparent, I am Jazz, I am Cait, and HerStory. Something that I can't believe I somehow have missed the last couple years is the Imperfectu International Film and Gender Festival.
I was lucky to run across Imperfectu since I rarely think to search for film festivals in general, but this one just grabbed me. One of the hardest things to convey about being transgender is how much it effects my day to day life. Simply knowing someone identifies as a gender differing from their biological sex at birth, while sometimes being focused on, is not enough to get an idea of what it's like to 'put it all out there' and interact with society daily. Even the small tasks like going to the store can sometimes be an anxious experience.
Some of the transgender related shows I mentioned provided some of the 'behind the scenes' issues we deal with like the complexity of dating, anxiety on how people view me (or how I feel I pass) to simply trying to explain those inner feeling that have lead me down this path. Transparent, I am Jazz and HerStory did a great job of this in particular.
This is why I was thrilled to run across the Imperfectu: International Film and Gender Festival! Just what I've seen so far in there does such a great job highlighting many of the unseen issues transgender people face, from a realistic point of view. Not everything can be fairies, unicorns and happy endings, especially with sad state of transgender statistics including violent acts, discrimination, murder and suicide rates.
Neighbors Trailer from Rachel Goldberg on Vimeo.
This quote from the Imperfectu website perfectly describes their focus:
International Film and Gender Studies Festival explores the infinite possibilities that the fields of sex, gender and sexuality offer, questioning the primacy of conventions we are limited to by the gender binary system and heteronormativity.
Living in the USA it's easy to forget how rough being LGBT can be for those in the international community as a whole. Many countries are far more conservative than what I personally am commonly exposed to here. I love how this film festival lets me glimpse myself as well as have resources to share with others to give a better idea of what my LGBT brothers and sisters (or whatever non-binary term may apply) have to face in their countries.
Un Buen Hijo / A Good Son from luis montijo on Vimeo.
Even their in depth mission which enhances LGBT awareness and understanding is beautifully stated as:
Through film, art, and gender studies, Imperfectu: International Film and Gender Festival celebrates and examines the diversity of gender identities and expressions, as well as of sexual identities and orientations, while embracing varied and alternative feminisms.
Imperfectu explores the infinite possibilities that sex, gender and sexuality fields offer to us, questioning the primacy of the conventions to which the binary gender system and heteronormativity limit us. Furthermore, this festival gives room to feminist expressions that know how to include these infinite possibilities in their discourses.
-Source
I plan to keep digging into the previous films from the Imperfectu: International Film and Gender Festival which started in Tijuana, Mexico and has been running for a couple years now. Maybe if I'm lucky I'll be able to get an opportunity to actually attend the festival in person in the not so far off future.
I'd love to hear from any readers if you've heard of other transgender specific shows, documentaries or movies that may help to provide awareness or understanding of what life is like for us by tossing it in a comment below.
Additional Reading and Media:
Imperfectu Film Festival
Her Story
Transparent
I am Jazz
Hello @sykochica,
It gives us pleasure to inform you that you have been chosen as a featured author by the @robinhoodwhale initiative.
Learn more about the Robinhood Whale here!
We hope to see you continuing to post some great stuff on Steemit!
Good luck!
~RHW~
Oh... I saw you only got the English Version link. But don't be fooled we stopped in 2014. We just didn't have funding for translating and managing all our content in 2015 and upcoming 2016 events. But if your Spanish is good, you will find more content on our Spanish page at: http://imperfectu.com/es/
Ahh, gotcha. I didn't notice that part, and had seen some spread in dates between youtube and vimeo. Sorry about that :(
Unfortunately I have one of those ironic screen names in that I speak no next to no Spanish. I'm a native English speaker who remembers a little French from high school/collage and a tiny bit of Hebrew from waaaaay long ago. Lol.
I'd really love to see this back up and running again! Maybe the content you're going to be bringing to Steemit can help fund it. While I know many of the LGB in the US have somewhat gotten over the 'hump' legally, the focus in 'pop culture' has now shifted to the transgender community. I believe the statistic is that 9 out of 10 people know or love somebody that is gay (with the awareness campaign starting in the early 80's)...the trans community now needs to start moving towards having stats like these.
You're film festival is a great way to help many 'step out of the shadows' to let that happen.
I read now the post. Nicely written! Sure, bringing in some extra revenue for our content creators would be huge, and extra cash for translators to keep the festival bilingual even better. Thanks again.
Thank you! :)
I guarantee you there are people already here who would jump at the chance of offering translation services! I can ask around and see if I can at least get contact info for whenever it'd be needed. :)
You guys should presell tickets to 2017 here on steemit and let people pay in SBD
That'd be interesting!
Thank you so much for this post, @sykochica! Imperfectu ( @imperfectu ) will soon start posting about its previous and next moves. We are so thankful to have people like you backing up our ideas. :)
Let me know when that happens and I will reblog it for you too!
More than happy to post on this! I can't wait to see what you all have in store for us here!
You've definitely got my backing! And like @williambanks mentioned, I've got the reblogger ready to go as well :D
(Should we just start calling it resteem instead? It's gonna change anyway. lol)
Hi @sykochica, I'm right in the middle of something, so to be honest I didn't read your article yet, but will do for sure later. However, thanks so much for featuring us. @jomaze is my wife who really should earn all the credit for creating this Festival. We will soon be using Steem as our primary blog space, so there will be more of the LGBTQIA crowds flowing into this space... stay tuned. :)
Oh no worries! Imperfectu just came on my radar recently and today was the day to talk about it! Just with what
I've seen so far it's an amazing project and very meaningful to me. I've got both you and your wife on follow now so I won't miss any posts when the time comes.
I'm really pretty excited to see some LBGTQIA influx here. I can personally attest it's a comfortable place to bear one's soul, especially on topics of sexual orientation and gender identity. A good percentage of my posts for a while have been on LGBT related issues, but somewhat limited since I mainly talk from personal experience. I did do a bit more research in What is Gender? and What is Non-Binary Gender, Genderqueer or Genderfluid? though. Lol.
Anyway...I can't wait to see what you all bring to Steemit! :D
Nice work. Upvoted
Thank you!
Upvoted and reblogged!
The imperfectu festival is a project of @alechahn and his wife.
Great job @sykochica !
TYTY!
Tell them what they've put together is massively impressive!! And thanks for setting it up in the first place!
excellent post congratulations
Thank you! This was a fun one to share!
Outside the last handful of years, most the transgender media I'd been exposed to was mostly done in comedic fashion, which while entertaining...only so useful. These are just flat out helpful both for me and to recommend to others wanting a better understanding of being trans (even if not out to anybody.)
Steemit is the venue to discuss any topics, in fact the wider the spectrum of topics, the better
I completely agree!
I do have to admit that I never would have posted any of my LGBT related or personal story stuff anywhere else but Steemit! No troll comments, no hate, nothing but support.
While shows like those you've mentioned are great for spreading the kind of hidden inner world of trans* people, I really love how the show Sense8 treats the trans character as they do any of the other characters. Normalization is humanization. Of course, I shouldn't be surprised considering both of the Wachowskis have now transitioned. 😆
I keep forgetting to binge watch that one! Think I got distracted after the first episode, but I remember liking it. :)
I do completely agree with the normalization is humanization statement. Frequently people model another person by a characteristic like LGBTQIA, race, religion, etc. and completely missing the essence (or homonculous is @williambanks is watching) of who they really are.
Always watching you. Don't always, always watch. But I read all I can.
Post included in: Steemprentice Spotlight for September 26th