Side by Side (film festival)
"Side by Side" Lesbian and Gay International Film Festival («Bok o Bok», Russian: Международный ЛГБТ-Кинофестиваль «Бок о Бок») is an international film festival that seeks to explore the issues of homosexuality, bisexuality and transgender (LGBT) through art cinema.
The Side by Side film festival aims to establish an open cultural space in which Russian society and the LGBT community can enter into a broad discussion and generate a positive dialogue, thus contributing to the struggle against discrimination based on sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.
In addition, the festival offers a space where homosexual and transgender persons can feel comfortable with themselves and affirm, question and extend their identities.
The non-competition program includes a variety of events: unique retrospective screenings, exhibitions, photo competitions, book presentations, concerts, workshops etc.
Every event hosts special guests, well-known international and Russian experts in the field of art, sociology, psychology or human rights.
By the 21st century, neither a human rights movement nor an LGBT community as a group of people, united by common values and conscious of the shared cultural and historical fate, had been formed.
The organizers strived to create an open cultural space for the self-development and reflection of the LGBT community while at the same time exposing the problems of the LGBT community known to the general public by building a positive dialogue between the minority and the majority, deconstructing myths and stereotypes, helping to change the public opinion and develop understanding, acceptance and tolerance.
The idea of running a film festival in Saint Petersburg first came up in a meeting between Manny de Guerre and Irina Sergeyeva in the summer of 2007.
A wide resonance and heated discussions arose in society as the plan of organizing the festival was announced publicly at the end of December.
Director Alexandr Sokurov, rock musician Svetlana Surganova, sociologist Igor Kon, poet Marina Chen, actor Anatoliy Ravikovich, human rights defender Sergey Grigoryants, politician Valeriya Novodvorskaya, British novelist Sarah Waters, British human rights defender Peter Tatchell, Israeli producer Eytan Fox, Israeli producer Gal Uchovsky, American producer John Cameron Mitchell,[1] and LGBT-activist Nikolay Alexeyev gave their support to the film festival.
Representatives of The International Association of Cinematographers of Slavic and Orthodox People, actors Nikolai Burlyayev and Mikhail Porechenkov, producer Mark Rudinshtein, artist Oleg Basilashvili, director Yevgeniy Tatarskiy, head of the press service of the Russian Orthodox Church Mikhail Moiseyev, and the head of the city committee for culture Nikolay Burov were against the film festival.
In February 2008, Dom Kino cinema, the planned venue for the screenings, terminated the preliminary agreement with the festival organizers due to "building repairs".
At the same time the police were conducting spot-checks at Bunker and Central Station gay clubs, during which the visitors were insulted, humiliated, and blackmailed.
In October 2008, the new venues that had been found (clubs Sochi and The Palace) were closed on the eve of the festival for two weeks by fire inspections.
[2][3][4][5] After these events, civil youth movements Oborona and LGBT-organization Coming Out sent an open letter to the governor of Saint Petersburg Valentina Matviyenko demanding that she comment on the situation.
After hearing about the closure of the festival, they changed their programme at Dom Kino and screened a film about transgender boys Komnata Viki i Zheni.
The screenings were followed by discussions in which the festival guests director John Cameron Mitchell, Rodney Swell, Maxim Zirin, representatives of the Berlin International Film Festival's Teddy Award Klaus Ascheneller and New Fest Director Basil Tsiokos, and Russian transgender Julietta among others participated.
Organizer Manny de Guerre was invited to the 59th Berlin International Film Festival as a member of the Teddy Award jury.
Besides the film screenings, several roundtable discussions were organized on various issues: human rights and discrimination, the history of the LGBT-community, coming out, same-sex marriage, children with same-sex parents, problems of elderly LGBT people, transgender myths and reality, masculinity in contemporary society, religion and sexuality, among others.
Before the presentation of the book Malchik — otets muzhchiny by Igor Kon, correspondents of NTV and a group of nationalists led by Roman Zentsov showed up in the hall where a discussion was to take place.
This year the film festival found a visual embodiment for its award called BoBik (an analogue of the Berlin bear Teddy and the Venetian Queer Lion).
However, the city cinema halls Dom Kino and Rodina refused to conduct the screenings "on ideological grounds" and after pressure from the prosecutor broke the rental contract with the Mikhail Chemyakin Foundation.
This year a series of screenings was successfully completed in Novosibirsk and Kemerovo, in February on the issue of coming out and in April as part of the Week Against Homophobia.
In May the film festival showed its program of 2010 in open venues and unlike the year before, this time the event passed without incidents.
