Beyond Gay: The Politics of Pride

Synopsis

Over the course of a year, film follows Vancouver Pride Society president Ken Coolen to various international Pride events, including Poland, Hungary, Russia, Sri Lanka and others where there is great opposition to pride parades. In North America, Pride is complicated by commercialization and a sense that the festivals are turning away from their political roots toward tourism, party promotion and entertainment. Christie documents the ways larger, more mainstream Pride events have supported the global Pride movement and how human rights components are being added to more established events. In the New York sequence, leaders organize an alternative Pride parade, the Drag March, set up to protest the corporatization of New York Pride. A parade in São Paulo, the world's largest Pride festival, itself includes a completely empty float, meant to symbolize all those lost to HIV and to anti-gay violence.

Appearances

A number of personalities appear in interviews for the documentary including:

Ken Coolen - Parade Director, Vancouver Pride Society

Gilbert Baker - Creator of the GLBT Rainbow flag

Sahran Abeysundara - Director of Equal Ground Sri Lanka

Tomasz Baczkowski - President, Warsaw Equality Parade

Dean Nelson - Director, Vancouver Pride Society

Libby Davies - Member of Parliament, Vancouver East

Fatima Amarshi - Executive Director, Pride Toronto

Scott Long - Human Rights Watch

Rev. Brent Hawkes - Metropolitan Church of Toronto

Gareth Henry - J-FLAG Jamaica

Franco Reinado - President, Gay & Lesbian Travel Assoc of Brazil

Nikolai Alekseev - Founder, Moscow Pride

Cleve Jones - Creator of Names Project Memorial Quilt, friend to Harvey Milk

Events covered

The documentary shows footage of a number of parades including:

InterPride 2007 (Zurich Switzerland) where Ken Coolen and parade co-director, Dean Nelson, attend an international conference of Pride organizations. Many human rights activists are interviewed, including American artist and activist Gilbert Baker creator of the first rainbow flag.

São Paulo Pride Parade (Brazil) where 4 million participants in a government-sponsored Pride with the theme of the year Homophobia Kills!

Moscow Pride (Russia) with archiving clandestine preparations for this event and a violent counter protest

Pride Colombo (Sri Lanka) where Pride events are only advertised after they take place, in order to protect the identities of those brave enough to attend. Meeting Sahran Abeysundra, who later travels to Canada to be a Grand Marshal in Vancouver Parade.

Vancouver Pride (Canada) for the anniversary entitled Celebrating 30 Years of the Rainbow

Awards

Morris Chapdelaine, Oliver-Barret Lindsay, Charlie David and Bob Christie

2009: Won Jury Award for Best Documentary at Image+Nation Festival in Montreal, Canada

2009: Won the Audience Award for "Documentary" category at Out on Film; Atlanta LGBT Film Festival.

2009: Won the Best Documentary Award at Fairy Tales International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, Calgary Alberta

2009: Won the Best Documentary Award at Q Cinema, Fort Worth Texas

2009: Won the Best Documentary Award at Reel Pride, Winnipeg Manitoba

2009: Won the Jury Award for "Best Documentary Film" at Seattle Lesbian & Gay Film Festival

2009: Won the Audience Award for "Favorite Documentary" at Seattle Lesbian & Gay Film Festival

2010: Won the HBO Best Documentary Film Award at the Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival

2010: Won the "Best of the Festival" award at Indianapolis LGBT Film Festival

Others

2010: Michael Wiskar Nominated for "Best Musical Score in a Documentary Program or Series" at Leo Awards

2010: Steve Schmidt Nominated for "Best Picture Editing in a Documentary Program or Series" at Leo Awards