Location | Various locations in Beijing, China |
---|---|
Founded | 2001 (by Cui Zi'en) |
Directors | Jenny Man Wu (co-director) |
Hosted by | Beijing Queer Film Festival Committee |
Festival date | September each year |
Language | International |
Website | Official website (Chinese & English) |
Beijing Queer Film Festival (BJQFF),[1] (Chinese: 北京酷儿影展), is an LGBT film festival, held annually in Beijing, the capital city of the People's Republic of China. It was the first LGBT film festival to be established in mainland China, founded in 2001 by the Chinese author and LGBT film director Cui Zi'en, a professor at the Beijing Film Academy.[2]
Other Chinese-language LGBT film festivals in the region, which also feature international LGBT films with Chinese subtitles, include CINEMQ, Hong Kong Lesbian & Gay Film Festival, ShanghaiPRIDE Film Festival and Taiwan International Queer Film Festival. Like the Beijing Queer Film Festival, Shanghai Queer Film Festival, is a volunteer-run, not-for-profit event, and aims to help facilitate and promote the work of filmmakers from Chinese and other Asian backgrounds.[3]
Beijing has a large LGBT community.[4] The Festival originated from Peking University, and is considered to be "the only community-based non-governmental film festival in China with a special focus on gender and sexuality".[5]
In 2011, Chinese filmmaker Yang Yang made a documentary entitled Our Story: The Beijing Queer Film Festival’s 10 Years of “Guerrilla Warfare” (我們的故事:北京酷兒影展十年游擊戰), reporting on the struggles of the Festival and the team behind it, and examining the role of the Chinese government's media censorship.[5]