The Newark LGBTQ Film Festival is hosting its second annual event on Friday, April 26 through Sunday, April 28. The weekend will be filled with a full line up of films, panels, and special events at various venues throughout downtown Newark, all celebrating LGBTQ BIPOC films and filmmakers who are often overlooked in mainstream media.
The Newark LGBTQ Community Center, one of the sponsors for the film festival, launched in 2013 in response to the stabbing of Sakia Gunn, a 15-year-old lesbian, who was murdered in Downtown Newark after refusing the advances of a young man. Twenty years after her death, consistent lobbying by community organizers have led to the renaming of the intersection of Halsey and Academy streets as “Sakia Gunn Way.”
Gunn’s life is being honored at this year’s festival for the second time. At the inaugural event, the documentary, “Dreams Deferred: The Sakia Gunn Film Project” was screened. This year, organizers took it a step further. Partnering with Express Newark’s Community Media Center, they offered proposals from filmmakers looking to develop projects inspired by Gunn’s life.
LGBTQ Film Festival founder Denise Hinds says, “Being able to show the works of so many unseen BIPOC Queer Filmmakers and to do it in Newark—a place with such rich Queer history—is so fitting.”
Films such a “The Stroll,” “Barrio Boy,” “Only the Lovers” and “Pacemaker” will all be featured at the second annual LGBTQ Film Festival.
