The San Diego Latino Film Festival begins this weekend. As it has for the past seven years it will be continuing its mission to help correct the often distorted images seen on television and in the movies by revealing LGBT lives through international film in the 8th outing of their Cine Gay Showcase.
Challenging the historical exclusion of underrepresented communities in the media, the festival takes advantage of the opportunity of this showcase to highlight experiences of gay life in different corners of the world underlying the universal experience as well as the unique expressions of the Latino LGBT community.
The festival runs for ten days (March 7-17) with Cine Gay Showcase fare scheduled throughout. Several feature films will be screened and there will be a program of shorts on the closing weekend.
The films being presented this year hail from Cuba, Spain, Chile and the U.S. and English subtitles will accompany most (but check in advance) movies. Themes addressed in the diverse assortment of films offered this year are your usual run of the mill storylines; situations that I am sure most of us can identify with: transsexual divas, love triangles, porn ambitions, political unrest and sheepherding in rural Mexico.
It all sounds fabulous to me and a welcome relief from the same old Hollywood chic flix and action heroes. Viva Cine Gay!
