One of the few good cultural events taking place in the culturally sometimes very conservative and commercially-minded Turku is the Vinokino film festival for queer film. This year I went to see two batches of short films and one long feature, Suddenly, last winter, an Italian documentary about the hopeless resistance from politicians to a law draft suggesting (some minimalist) rights for gay and unmarried people (the right to visit one's partner at the hospital, acknowledgement of partnership and so on). But the few fore-runners of the law in the Prodi government have few allies in the Italian parliament. Ever-lasting meetings are held and new negotiation groups are formed. Luca and Gustav, journalists and lovers, undertake a journey to the heart of darkness. They conduct interviews with people in a fascist march, religious rallies, political meetings. At one point of the film Luca sums the kinds of situation they find themselves in quite neatly: "Why should we interview these people? They are like broken records. They say the same things over and over again." After the film, Gustav Hofer replied to questions from the audience. One of the interesting things he said was that EU takes a lot of issues with economic pressure, but with regards to civil rights, EU is not quite as eager to take action.
Among the short films, there were a few good ones.
Braedrabylta Wrestling: Wrestlers in Iceland
Tango Finlandia: Tango, two men, a fight - love.
Kompisar: A sensitive depiction of male friendship that might or might not turn into something different
The saddest boy in the world: Dark-humoured tale about a boy who is all wrong.
Uralin perhonen got a lot of attention in Finnish media before almost anyone had seen it, the reason being that one of this animated film's protagonists is C.G. Mannerheim, by many Finns conceived as the ultimate war hero. In this feature, our war hero loves nobody but the boy he has found somewhere east off the Ural mountains. What makes the film such a pleasant experience is the music, Russian folk music.
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