High Tide

Brazilian tourist Lourenço is left behind when his American boyfriend deserts him in Provincetown at the end of the summer season. Lourenço passes the time with random hookups, talking to the locals who hire him to do maintenance and flirting with a hot tourist named Maurice (James Bland). Lourenço has to decide how to deal with shadows of his past that won’t let go and the harsh reality of being an undocumented immigrant in the USA.
In his debut film, director Marco Calvani puts Brazilian actor Marco Pigossi (“Gen V”, “Invisible City”) at the heart of a sexy and melancholic story about an immigrant after an unexpected breakup. Alongside Pigossi you’ll find Academy Award winner Marisa Tomei, Bill Irwin (“Rustin”) and Mya Taylor (“Tangerine”).
Marco Calvani created a thoughtful and daring film that raises questions on queer life in the modern world.

National Anthem

21yo Dylan is a day laborer and a farm hand who works hard to support his family and be a father figure to his younger brother. Dylan is trying to keep on an appearance of stability but there’s something missing in his life. When he gets a temporary job on a communal queer ranch he feels that for the first time he belongs. He finds friends and falls in love. Sky (trans actress Eve Lindley) is a rodeo performer and the partner of the macho ranch owner Pepe. The two are happy to share their bodies with Dylan, but maybe it won’t be enough.
Charlie Plummer shines as the lead with a very natural, quiet and confident performance. Cinematographer Katelin Arizmendi re-imagines the coming-of-age movie against the stunning backdrop of New Mexico. Director Luke Gilford’s debut film is a hallelujah song to the ultimate queer American dream showcasing the real-life International Gay Rodeo Association.

Trans Memoria

Victoria examines her past in order to understand her gender affirming process and what it is that defines her as a woman.
After losing her best friend Meryl, with whom she went through transition, she shares the pain with Athena and Aamina, who are both in the process of transitioning themselves. Together, the three women explore who they were before and who they are today, listening to the ghosts of the past, the giggles of today and the whispers of the future.
Trans Memoria” is a personal, honest and deep piece that deals with the results of losing someone close and with life itself through the transgender experience. Heroines’ journey goes through Thailand and France, old video diaries, and illuminates the friendship of three women with unique internal lives.


In association with the Embassy of Sweden

“All About My Mother” & panel

Before the screening: A panel of cinema and television actresses hosted by Esti Zakheim (“Afula Express”, “Leylasede”), who will be joined by Hadas Yaron (“Fill the Void”), Moran Rosenblatt (“Paper Wedding”, “Fauda”), Sivan Levy (“Six Times”, “Bitty ‘Ahou’vatty”) and Lioz Levi (“HaMedovev”, “Malach Mashchit”).


25th anniversary of the film “All About My Mother”

Winner of the 2000 Foreign Film Academy Award. Almodovar’s 13th film is a wonderful melodrama about the journey of Manuela from Madrid to Barcelona, in search of the man she left 18 years ago, in order to tell him about their son, whom he never got to meet before the son was killed in a car accident.
All About My Mother” is Almodovar at his peak, with unforgettable characters, incredible aesthetics and sharp humor next to emotional maturity, deep understanding of the human soul and the ability to combine all these into a cinematic bomb of emotions.


In association with the Embassy of Spain

The Belle from Gaza

During the filming of her previous movie, director Yolande Zauberman heard a story of a young transgender woman who fled from Gaza after death threats based on her gender identity and came to Tel Aviv to live as her true self. Several years later Yolande Zauberman returns to Tel Aviv to look for her. While searching for the mysterious young woman she meets several Palestinian and Israeli trans women, some doing sex work and some other temp jobs, all of them reaching for their dreams in their own way.
The film “The Belle from Gaza” is a celebratory hymn to women who fight daily on that ever so dangerous line between Gaza and Tel Aviv just so that they could be themselves. “The Belle from Gaza” is a brave cinematic piece that puts a mirror in front of reality and offers images of struggles for self acceptance in a sad reality that is all conflict and oppression.


In association with the Embassy of France

 

Emilia Pérez

The new and much talked about musical crime drama by director Jacques Audiard (“Rust and Bone”, “A Prophet” “The Beat That My Heart Skipped”) which premiered at the last Cannes Film Festival to standing ovations. This film earned its amazing cast a joint award and the Judges Choice main award. This is the film that introduced to the world one of the best cinematic newcomers of recent years – transgender actress Karla Sofía Gascón, who takes over the screen and the viewers hearts with an unforgettable performance.

Zoe Saldaña (“Avatar”, “Guardians of the Galaxy”) is Rita, a frustrated lawyer who works for a big and corrupt company. One day she gets a chance to change her life – a one-on-one meeting with the head of one of the cruelest cartels in Mexico. To her immense surprise the man asks her to help him realize his dream – to undergo a gender affirming procedure and start a new life as a woman under the name of Emilia Pérez.
Other cast members include one of todays’ biggest stars as the cartel head’s wife, Selena Gomez (“Only Murders in the Building”) and the Israeli actor Mark Ivanir.
This is a film that you will not forget.


In association with the Embassy of France

Summer Qamp

Summer Qamp” is a documentary following a group of young LGBTQ people in an idyllic summer camp by a lake in Alberta, Canada, where the young campers enjoy the traditional camp experience, but in a safe and accepting environment.
Camp fYrefly is stationed deep in a green forest and is a summer refuge for teens on the LGBTQ spectrum, far from a hostile environment, in a place where they can give fly to their queerness and their gender identity.
The film invites the viewers to meet the guides as well as the young campers, all of whom are willing to share the challenges they face and what had led them to this particular camp in remarkable and moving honesty.


In association with the Embassy of Canada

Bar 51

Amos Guttman’s second feature film tells the story of a brother and sister from the country, who decide to find their luck in the big city Tel Aviv after the death of their mother. They meet Apollonia, the owner of a sleazy joint called “Bar 51”, who employs them at the bar, mostly because of her strong attraction to the brother, who in turn, is secretly in love with his own sister.
Apollonia is played by Ada Valerie Tal, the first Israeli transgender actress, and her character is based on Gila Goldstein, who used to perform at the real “Bar 51”.
“Bar 51” is a stylish creation that reminds of the early works of Fassbinder and Almodóvar.

Contains depictions of violence, including sexual assault and self harm.


This movie is part of Amos Guttman Retrospective

Marzipan Flowers

A special screening in memory of Rotem Kalderon, mother of Adam Kalderon
All the proceeds from the screening will go to the rebuilding of kibbutz Be’eri

Before the screening: Opening words
After the screening: conversation with Mika Kalderon, actresses: Nouli Omer, Tal Kalay and Efrat Aviv, and the producer Ori Hod.

Adam Kalderon, a native of kibbutz Be’eri, filmed there his debut feature “Marzipan Flowers” during the military operation “Amud Anan” (2012). The script was inspired by events from his mother’s life, who also assisted with the production. A decade had passed since the release of this special and different film. Kalderon’s 2nd feature “The Swimmer” screened at TLVfest 2022.

Hadas is working at the kibbutz laundry, when she’s informed that her husband Moshe was killed in a traffic accident. In one second Hadas’ entire world crashes down. After a hard year of mourning, the kibbutz is getting too stifling for Hadas and she realizes she can’t move on with her life. She decides to leave the kibbutz, where she lived her whole life, in favor of a new life in Tel Aviv. Penniless and provincial, she shares an apartment with Petel, a vibrant trans woman, and works as a waitress. The journey to the big city makes Hadas confront the fact that her youth is gone, but also with the dreams she never fulfilled, and she decides to realize those desires: she opens up her own place and experiences a late marzipan blossoming.

“Jerusalem Is Proud to Present” & Panel

After the screening, a panel will take place with 3 LGBTQ activists from different cities –
Reut Nagar (Tel Aviv), Shiri Bar-On (Mitzpe Ramon) & Nava Dissentshik (Rosh Haayin), hosted by the film creator Nitzan Gilady.

In the summer of 2006, Jerusalem was to host, for the first time in history, the World Pride events, which were to culminate in a traditional gay pride parade. The planned events stirred turmoil in the politically complex city, with Jewish, Muslim and Christian religious leaders banding together in an uncompromising battle against what they said would “defile the holy city”. On the other side stood the activists of the Open House, Jerusalem’s LGBT community center, who planned the events. Steadfast in the face of the heated and violent anti-gay sentiment, they had to deal with threats to much more than just their right to march.