The Florida Film Festival has 16 LGBTQ-themed films coming to its 33rd annual fest. Below is a list of each film, a brief synopsis and the days, times and locations for each showing.
Visit FloridaFilmFestival.com for more information and to purchase tickets. You can read more about this year’s festival here.
Narrative Features Competition:
“Riley”
Directed by Benjamin Howard
2023, 93 min, USA
East Coast Premiere
“Riley” is the feature debut from Emmy-winning writer/director Benjamin Howard about a disciplined high school athlete whose life unravels when his queer identity competes against who he’s supposed to be. Ambitious Dakota Riley begins his senior year within the confines of the steady monotony that comes with adolescence: sports, classrooms, dinner tables and school halls but things soon turn upside down. With high expectations for his athletic pursuits, Dakota lives within carefully designed boundaries, a calculated blueprint upon which he’s formed the basis of his world. His father, a football star who ended up getting hurt in the NFL, now coaches Riley’s team. But when the reality of his identity comes to light, Dakota is forced to confront the consequences of denying himself or coming to terms with who he really is. Howard and actor Jake Holley will be in attendance for both screenings.
April 15, 6:30 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
April 17, 4:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
Documentary Features Competition:
“The Herrincanes”
Directed by Olivia Kuan
87 min, USA, 2024
Southeast Premiere
Who knew that women’s full-tackle football existed in the 1970s? Enter the Houston Herricanes, a team made up of women from all walks of life that came together for the love of the game. Representing a city that was struggling with social issues and historical segregation, this diverse group of players were blazing a trail for women in the male-dominated game. However, unlike their male counterparts, they did not get paid. For four years this team played hard and bonded as friends and sometimes lovers. Then abruptly things ended, and most of them lost all contact with each other. Now, nearly 50 years later, the women reminisce about their experiences, and discuss how it was a defining moment in their lives and the history of the sport. Director Olivia Kuan will be in attendance on April 13.
April 13, 6:30 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
April 17, 3:45 p.m. @ Enzian Theater
Documentary Shorts Competition:
“Merman”
Directed by Sterling Hampton IV
11 min, USA, 2023
Southeast Premiere
Registered nurse. Civil right activist. Leather daddy. Andre Chambers will not be pigeonholed into any one stereotype. Through a film as visually interesting as Chambers’s own life, we come to see how it takes a struggle to be comfortable in your own skin and why that struggle is worth it. This film plays as part of the 6x Real: Documentary Shorts program.
April 16, 4:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
April 19, 1:45 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
“Seat 31: Zooey Zephyr”
Directed by Kimberly Reed
14 min, USA, 2024
Acclaimed FFF alumna Kimberly Reed (“Dark Money,” FFF 2019) aims her lens at expelled Montana House of Representatives legislator Zooey Zephyr, who turns a bench into her “office” while fighting for trans youth. This film runs with “Invisible Nation.”
April 14, 1:30 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
April 17, 1:00 p.m. @ Enzian Theater
Narrative Shorts Competition:
“Bust”
Directed by Angalis Field
10 min, USA, 2024
East Coast Premiere / 2nd US Screening
The loyalty of a transgender woman to the NYPD is called into question when she’s tasked with entrapping a fellow trans woman. This film plays as part of Shorts #2: “What’s Love Got to Do With It.”
April 13, 4:45 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
April 17, 9:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
“Deliver Me”
Directed by Joecar Hanna
16 min, USA/Spain, 2023
East Coast Premiere / 2nd US Screening
In this surreal science-fiction tale, a clone with a complicated relationship with his creator feels betrayed and enraged when he learns that his maker has made another clone and plans to sell it to a lascivious buyer. This film plays as part of Shorts #4: “Nothing Compares 2 U.”
April 14, 4:30 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
April 18, 9:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
“Diving In”
Directed by Nitzan Mager
7 min, USA, 2023
Florida Premiere
In this absurdist send-up of bodily insecurities from Nitzan Mager (“Run Amok,” FFF 2023), a woman frets about getting intimate after a first date for fear her partner might be spooked by her, er, unique anatomy. Director Nitzan Mager and writer/producer M. Rowan Meyer will be in attendance on April 14. This film plays as part of Shorts #5: “If I Should Fall From Grace with God.”
Apr 14, 9:30 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
Apr 19, 4:15 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
“Places of Worship”
Directed by Bridget Frances Harris
13 min, USA, 2024
World Premiere
A devout Catholic altar girl struggles to reconcile her faith with the feelings she has for her female coworker, but fortunately for her, the Virgin Mary appears to help her suss it all out. Director Bridget Frances Harris and actor Sabrina Lauren Michaels will be in attendance on April 14. This film plays as part of Shorts #4: “Nothing Compares 2 U.”
April 14, 4:30 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
April 18, 9:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
“Romance Package for Two”
Directed by Carlen May-Mann
14 min, USA, 2023
East Coast Premiere
A couple’s monotonous relationship is put to the test when a dominatrix takes up residence for the week in their kitschy roadside motel in director Carlen May-Mann’s (producer of FFF 2020’s “The Three Men You Meet at Night”) beautifully lensed drama. Director Carlen May-Mann and producer Noah Dirks will be in attendance on April 14. This film plays as part of Shorts #3: “A House is Not a Home.”
April 14, 2:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
April 18, 6:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
Animated Shorts Competition:
“Discoteque”
Directed by Masashi Yamamoto
5 min, USA, 2023
Florida Premiere
Two male lovers eat each other and dance on their flight to a giant disco ball in space. This film plays as part of Animated Shorts: “The Weight.”
April 17, 6:45 PM @ Enzian Theater
April 19, 9:00 PM @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
“edith and the small child”
Directed by Kohana Wilson
7 min, USA, 2024
East Coast Premiere / 2nd US Screening
An anxious recluse fends off stir-craziness, gender reckoning and visions of a massive prehistoric ground sloth. This hand-drawn, black-and-white, pencil animation about hair, puberty and body dysphoria won the Grand Jury Award for Animation at Slamdance 2024. This film plays as part of Animated Shorts: “The Weight.”
April 17, 6:45 p.m. @ Enzian Theater
April 19, 9:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
International Features:
“The Queen of My Dreams”
Directed by Fawzia Mirza
97 min, Canada/Pakistan, 2023
Set against the backdrop of their shared love for Bollywood fantasies, a queer, first-generation Canadian girl, Azra (“Sex Lives of College Girls” star Amrit Kaur) and her mother Mariam (Nimra Bucha), a conservative Islamic Pakistani woman, navigate the complexities of womanhood, family and tradition across three different eras.
April 17, 3:30 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
April 21, 12:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
International Shorts:
“Seahorse Parents”
Directed by Miriam Guttmann
10 min, The Netherlands, 2023
East Coast Premiere
Four soon-to-be parents share their personal stories of pregnancy as transgender men. This film plays as part of the International Shorts #2 program.
April 20, 2:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
April 21, 6:00 p.m. @ Enzian Theater
Florida Shorts:
“Space Coast”
Directed by Caroline Bates
14 min, USA, 2023
Southeast Premiere
Following the retirement of NASA’s space shuttle in 2011, three students at Astronaut High School watch their hometown dissolve as they reminisce on the past and hold out hope for the future. Director Caroline Bates and cast will be in attendance on April 20. This film plays as part of Sunshine & Swampland: New Florida Shorts.
April 20, 12:00 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
Music Films:
“Lost Angel: The Genius of Judee Sill”
Directed by Andy Brown and Brian Lindstrom
91 min, USA, 2023
Footnotes of music history tend to be more interesting than chapter headings. Judee Sill’s footnote? She was the first artist signed by David Geffen’s Asylum Records, home to the most successful L.A. singer/songwriters in the 1970s. Sill recorded two stunning albums, blending aching confessional lyrics with folk, classical and gospel. They bombed, and she was dropped by Asylum, dying a few years later of an overdose. Although she once graced the cover of Rolling Stone, she was basically forgotten. “Lost Angel” digs deep to uncover the complicated life of Judee Sill, who was far more than a failed singer/songwriter.
April 18, 3:30 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater A)
April 21, 11:30 a.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
Midnight Shorts:
“NOHOMO”
Directed by J. Santos
5 min, USA, 2023
“NOHOMO” is a queer journey through the mind of Dick, whose mundane commute to work erupts into a phallic kaleidoscope of the subconscious. This was legit animated on a Nintendo 3DS. This film plays as part of Midnight Shorts.
Apr 13, 11:59 p.m. @ Enzian Theater
Apr 19, 11:59 p.m. @ Regal Winter Park Village (Theater B)
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