15h30

(Best Documentary Competition)
Fig Trees, by John Greyson (Canada, 2009, 104’)

In 1999, South African AIDS activist Zackie Achmat went on a treatment strike, refusing to take his pills until they
were widely available to all South Africans. This symbolic act became a cause celebre, helping build his group Treatment Action Campaign into a national movement – yet with each passing month, Zackie grew sicker... Fig Trees is a documentary opera about AIDS activists Tim McCaskell in Toronto and Zackie Achmat in Capetown. Narrated by an albino squirrel, an amputee busker and St. Teresa of Avila, it tells the story of Zackie’s treatment strike in song, and the larger story of the fight for pills on two continents, and across two decades. Fig Trees also performs musical and political inversion on the music and words of Gertrude Stein’s 1934 avant-garde classic Four Saints in Three Acts.

17h30

(Feature Film Competition)
Wu Sheng Feng Ling | Soundless Wind Chime, by Kit Hung (Hong Kong, Switzerland, 2009, 100’)

Soundless Wind Chime is the poetic journey of Ricky, searching for the lost soul and the past of his deceased Swiss lover, Pascal. The film shows a battle of love, lust, reality, memory and illusions and the grief everybody bears every day. Ricky – a new Chinese immigrant in Hong Kong; and Pascal – a 27 years old Swiss rebel escaped from his traditional boundaries, meet in Hong Kong. Ricky works as a waiter in a local restaurant and lives with his aunt who is a street prostitute. Pascal is a thief and enjoys the advantages of his European status in this post-colonial Asian city. After being abused by his roommate, Pascal moves in with Ricky. Although Ricky makes it easier for Pascal to immerse himself into local culture, life is never easy for these rootless hearts. They are tortured by the dilemma of whether their relationship is built on true love or only dependency on each other and the fear of being lonely. While Pascal is tempted by the glamorous and lustful gay world in Hong Kong, Ricky is holding onto his belief and waits for a sign of true love. Without even saying goodbye, Pascal passes away in an accident. Ricky carries his grief and sorrows to Switzerland, looking for hints of Pascal in a nameless village. When he visits a beautiful thrift store, Ricky meets Ueli, a man that looks identical to Pascal, but has a totally different personality…

19h30

(Queer Memory Special Screening)
The Wizard of Oz, by Victor Fleming (USA, 1939, 101’)

Based on the well-known novel by Frank L. Baum, The Wizard of Oz tells the story of little Dorothy Gale who lives in Kansas with her uncle Henry and auntie Em. Trying to save her beloved dog Toto from the clutches of the dreaded Miss Gulch, she gets caught by a tornado that carries her to the Wonderful World of Oz. Once there, she accidentally kills the Wicked Witch of the East and meets Glinda, the Good Witch of the North. Before long, she is travelling towards the Emerald City in order to find the Wizard of Oz, the only person that can send her back to Kansas. Along the way, she meets three unexpected companions (a scarecrow longing for a brain, a tin man in need of a heart and a lion searching for his courage) and faces the countless perils set upon her by the frightening Witch of the West.

22h00

(Feature Film Competition)
O Signo da Cidade | The Sign of the City, by Carlos Riccelli (Brazil, 2008, 95’)

While asteroids and stars roam the São Paulo skyline, thrusting their magic randomly, men and women question
themselves on what will be of their hopes and dreams. Gil is married and alone. Lydia plays with fire. Josialdo was born to be a woman. Mônica just wants to succeed in life. In her late night radio show in which she takes phone calls from anonymous listeners, Teca, an astrologer, finds herself lost in between other peoples’ longings and her own problems. Little by little, fate entwines them all in the same web. On the quest to overcome isolation and finding redemption, they will discover the life changing power of solidarity.

0h00 / SHORTS FILM GAY VINTAGE PROGRAMME (Queer Art)

The Window, by Philippe Gosselin, Ronald Regina (USA, 2008, 5’)

The Window is a short comedy about the profound liberation – and pleasure! – that comes from letting go of inhibitions, embracing all of who you are and revealing your soul and yourself to the world.

A Night at the Adonis, by Jack Deveau (USA, 1978, 83’)

A good-looking store owner unsuccessfully tries to seduce his husky employee, who turns him down preferring a visit to his hairdresser, whose barber chair has more functions than just for cutting hair. But when he tries to prolong the visit by inviting the hairdresser to dinner, he also gets turned down. Meanwhile, the frustrated store
owner decides to go to the Adonis, a famous New York City porn theatre, where he hopes to alleviate some of his tensions. What he doesn’t know is that both the employee and the hairdresser will show up there. After all, throughout the 1970’s everybody in New York City wound up at the Adonis Theatre sooner or later. From the balcony to the boiler room, with some lengthy visits to the theatre’s restrooms, a wide range of customers (from young to mature, from leather to clean-cut) engage in all sort of sexual enjoyment. And through it all, excerpts of some other classics from Handin- Hand films are being played on the screen of the Adonis Theatre: Sex Magic, Narcissus II and Bagdad. With all its bell bottoms and sideburns, A Night at the Adonis is a nostalgic return to a carefree, hedonistic era, where sex was just pleasure and nothing else.