Film industry still unfriendly place for LGBT people, says Vancouver Queer Film Festival artistic director

The artistic director ofthe Vancouver Queer Film Festival,saysthe film industry still has a long way to goin terms of providing access and opportunities for marginalized people in the business.

The presence ofLGBTactors andstorylinesin mainstream film has increasedin the last decades,with films such asCall Me By Your Name and A Fantastic Woman winning awards and gaining international attention, said AnoushkaRatnarajah

However,Ratnarajah, who has screened work by LGBT filmmakers since the festival's inception nearly 30 years ago,said the industry is still an unfriendly place forLGBTpeople.

"Unfortunately a lot of those stories are still not told by actual queer filmmakers,"Ratnarajah told Stephen Quinn, host of CBC'sThe Early Edition.

"Queer, trans and two-spirit actors, like filmmakers, directors and scriptwriters, have very little access to opportunities to perform. When they are given parts they're often put in these tokenizing roles that don't explore the full nuance of who we are as people."

The festivalwas formerly known as the Vancouver Lesbian Film Festival.

A program from the festival'sinaugural event in 1989 promoted itas a place to "examine race and class issues and recognize how doubly difficult it is for lesbians of colour and working class lesbians to work as filmmakers because of the frustrating inaccessibility of resources."

Ratnarajahsaid that goal rings true today.

"Film is traditionally quite an inaccessible art medium," she says."It's very expensive. Marginalized people like women, queer people,transpeople, people of colour, have often been kept out of the film industry by gatekeepers, mostly straight white men."

And, while LGBT stories are being told in popular movies, there are still filmmakers whose works are being missed by the general public. According to Ratnarajah, this is why the film festival remains vital.

"Festivals like ours offer opportunities for artists who don't have as many opportunities to show their films at festivals. Afestival showing is really meaningful in the CV of a filmmaker."

The festival runs from Aug. 9 to 19.

With files from The Early Edition

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