Queer Film Culture: Performative Aspects of LGBT/Q Film Festivals Dissertation zur Erlangung des Grades der Doktorin der Philosophie bei der Fakultät für Geisteswissenschaften an der Universität Hamburg vorgelegt von Skadi Loist aus Schwerin Hamburg, Dezember 2014 Mündliche Prüfung (Disputation): 10. März 2015 Gutachter_innen: Prof. Dr. Joan Kristin Bleicher Prof. Dr. Malte Hagener Prof. Dr. Martin Jörg Schäfer To my patient grandmother, Charlotte Loist (*23.10.1924) Table of Contents Table of Figures ............................................................................................................... 7 Acknowledgements .......................................................................................................... 8 Introduction Performing Queer Film Culture .................................................................................. 12 1. Objective and Research Question ........................................................................... 14 2. Academic and Social Relevance ............................................................................. 22 3. Chapter Layout ....................................................................................................... 26 Chapter One: The Performative Nature of Film Festivals: Theories and Methods . 26 Chapter Two: Historical Development of the Festival Circuit ................................ 27 Chapter Three: Performing Festival Culture: Selection, Exhibition and Reception 28 Chapter One The Performative Nature of Film Festivals: Theories and Methods ........................ 29 1. A New Research Field ............................................................................................ 29 2. Theoretical Frameworks ......................................................................................... 33 2.1 Performative, Performativity, Performance ...................................................... 34 2.2 Performing Film Festivals / Film Festival Performance ................................... 40 2.3 Connecting Film Festival Theorizations ........................................................... 45 Transformations .................................................................................................... 46 Public Sphere ........................................................................................................ 47 3. Methodology ........................................................................................................... 50 3.1 Positionality, Qualitative and Quantitative Methods ........................................ 50 3.2 Queer Studies: Notes on Terminology .............................................................. 55 3.3 Film Festivals as Research Objects ................................................................... 58 3.3.1 Film Festival—a Definition ........................................................................ 58 3.3.2 The Film Festival Circuit ............................................................................ 62 3.3.3 Six Axes in the Study of Film Festivals ..................................................... 64 Axis One—Film as Work of Art ....................................................................... 65 Axis Two—Economic Continuum: From Production to Distribution .............. 67 Axis Three—Festival as Organization .............................................................. 69 Axis Four—Reception: Audiences and Exhibition ........................................... 72 Axis Five—Politics of Place ............................................................................. 73 Axis Six—The Film Festival Circuit and History ............................................. 74 4. Conclusion .............................................................................................................. 75 5 Chapter Two Historical Development of the Festival Circuit ........................................................... 76 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................. 76 2. The Contextual Frame: Film Festival History ........................................................ 82 2.1 The Rise of the Film Festival Model ................................................................. 82 Film Culture before Festivals ............................................................................... 83 Phase One: National Cinemas and Geopolitics .................................................... 84 Phase Two: Political Film and Programmed Cinephilia ...................................... 89 Phase Three: Proliferation, Professionalization and Diversification of the Circuit ................................................................................................................ 93 2.2 Historical Phases of the LGBT/Q Film Festival Circuit ................................... 99 3. Mapping the Circuit: Data Collection and Case Studies ...................................... 103 4. A Global History of LGBT/Q Film Festivals ....................................................... 110 4.1 Predecessors to Festivals: Gay and Lesbian Representation ........................... 111 4.2 First Generation of Gay & Lesbian Film Festivals ......................................... 113 4.3 Early 1990s: New Queer Cinema, Pink Dollars and Global Spread ............... 119 4.4 Late 1990s: Mainstreaming, Differentiation and Globalization ...................... 128 4.5 The Early 2000s: New Global Festivals and Professionalization ................... 140 4.6 Today (2007–2015): Differentiation and Clustering ....................................... 143 5. Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 152 Chapter Three Performing LGBT/Q Film Festival Culture: Selection, Exhibition and Reception154 1. Introduction ........................................................................................................... 154 2. Selection: Performing Queer Cinema by Programming ....................................... 156 2.1 Selection and Film Festival Programming ...................................................... 156 2.2 What Is Queer Cinema? .................................................................................. 159 2.3 Curators and Screening Committees: Gatekeepers and Mediators ................. 162 2.4 LGBT/Q Programming Strategies ................................................................... 164 2.4.1 Representation By, For and About LGBT ................................................ 165 2.4.2 Failed Performatives: The Gendercator Incident ..................................... 169 2.4.3 Queer Programming Strategies ................................................................. 183 A Complicated Queerness ............................................................................... 184 I'm Not There ................................................................................................... 185 Girl’s Room ..................................................................................................... 187 2.5 Concluding Selection ...................................................................................... 188 3 Exhibition: The Festival as Performative Event .................................................... 189 3.1 Event, Aufführung, Contingency ..................................................................... 189 3.2 Scripts, Liveness and Mediation ..................................................................... 191 6 3.3 Time and Space ............................................................................................... 193 3.4 Queer Exhibition ............................................................................................. 195 4 Reception: Publics, Audiences, Communities ....................................................... 196 4.1 Public Spheres ................................................................................................. 197 4.1.1 Queer Counter Public Sphere and Film Festivals ..................................... 197 4.1.2 Intervention Public ................................................................................... 203 4.1.3 Performative Interventions: Scandals and Boycotts ................................. 206 Pinkwashing Debates ...................................................................................... 207 The Mayor, Lampedusa and the Political Strategies of the Festival in Hamburg .................................................................................................... 210 4.2 Audiences and Communal Reception ............................................................. 214 4.2.1 Festival Experience................................................................................... 214 4.2.2 Queer Reception Context.......................................................................... 216 4.2.3 Audience, LGBT/Q Community and Festival Community ...................... 218 4.2.4 Collective Viewing Experience ................................................................ 221 5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 223 Conclusion Queer Film Culture Performed .................................................................................. 226 Conclusions ................................................................................................................ 226 Further Research