50th San Francisco International LGBTQ+ Film Festival (Frameline50) Awards: ‘Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma,’ ‘Leviticus’ and More
Today, Frameline announced the winners of the juried and Audience Awards at the 50th San Francisco International LGBTQ+ Film Festival (Frameline50).
Since 1984, festival-goers have been responsible for selecting the Audience Awards for Best Narrative Feature and Best Documentary Feature. This year, Jane Schoenbrun’sTeenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma received the Frameline50 Audience Award for Narrative Feature. The Frameline50 Closing Night film held its West Coast premiere at the Festival, with star Hannah Einbinder and writer-director Schoenbrun in attendance. Schoenbrun was also honored at the screening with the Frameline Queer Lens Award for Filmmaking for bringing their singular vision to the screen.
Efraín Mojica & Rebecca Zweig’s Jaripeo received the Frameline50 Audience Award for Documentary Feature. A beautifully rendered work that pushes the boundaries of hybrid documentary filmmaking, Jaripeo also received a Frameline Completion Fund Grant ahead of its Sundance premiere earlier this year.
The world’s largest and longest-running queer film festival presented nearly 150 films from over 30 countries, brought 600 filmmakers and industry professionals from around the world to the Bay Area, and welcomed 50,000 attendees across its 11-day run.
“Frameline50 proves the undeniable fact that queer film is the future of independent cinema,” said Allegra Madsen, Frameline’s Executive Director. “This is reflected by the record-breaking attendance of and unwavering support from our global community of industry professionals, filmmakers, and movie lovers. What’s unique about this festival is that our audience is our industry and always has been. The filmmakers, the distributors, the critics, and the fans are the same people, in the same rooms, arguing and debating and falling in love with each other’s work. Creating the circumstances for this collision is fundamental to what Frameline does. Movements coalesce around people bumping up against each other, generating friction, building something none of them could have built alone. Frameline50 was proof that queer community is still the most powerful creative infrastructure in independent film.”
This year, the San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle (SFBAFCC), which has served as the jury for Outstanding First Narrative Feature since 2020, presented the honor to two films after votes ended in a statistical tie between Adrian Chiarella’s Leviticus , starring Joe Bird and Stacy Clausen, and Sam McConnell’s Test, starring the film’s screenwriter, Brock Yurich.
Juried by industry experts, the Outstanding Documentary Feature Award was given to Brydie O’Connor’s debut feature Barbara Forever, which centers on pioneering lesbian filmmaker and visual poet Barbara Hammer. A recipient of the Frameline Completion Fund Grant, the stunning documentary will have a theatrical release with Strand Releasing this fall. Mickey & Richard, directed by Ryan A. White and A.P. Pickle, received an Honorable Mention from the jury.
Juries also convened to recognize Morpheus & Charon (Morfeu e Caronte) by Luiz Ulian and Jocimar Dias Jr. with the Outstanding Narrative Short Award — with Shutterspeed, directed by Jasper De Maeseneer, and Yellow Bucket, directed by Simon Brooke receiving Honorable Mentions — and Doug + Me by Cecile Fountain-Jardim with the Outstanding Documentary Short Award — with Making It Fit, directed by Mariana Leal, and Oh Paulo, directed by Cam Archer receiving Honorable Mentions.
“Across the board, Frameline50’s award-winning films — whether selected by our juries or our audience — reflect something vital about this moment in queer and independent filmmaking,” said Kate Bove, Frameline’s Associate Director of Programs. “Jaripeo, Barbara Forever, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, Leviticus, Test — all of these features create beautiful friction in their own ways, either by reinventing form, upending expectations, or leveraging genres to make space for bold queer art. Whether reflecting our stories or histories, these films also propel us forward and, as inventive and subversive queer films always have, these works show us what’s possible and help us build a movement both on and off screen.”
Ahead of its penultimate festival screening — Give Me the Ball!, Liz Garbus and Elizabeth Wolff’s documentary about queer icon and tennis legend Billie Jean King — Frameline announced the winners of its juried awards. For decades, Frameline has presented the Outstanding First Narrative Feature Award to a narrative film as well as honors in the Outstanding Documentary Feature, Outstanding Narrative Short, and Outstanding Documentary Short categories.
Additionally, Frameline previously announced the winner of the annual Out in the Silence Award. Generously underwritten by Dean Hamer and Joe Wilson, the award honors an outstanding film that highlights brave acts of LGBTQ+ visibility. This year’s recipient was Kai Stänicke’s Trial of Hein (Der Heimatlose), who received the award ahead of his screening on June 25 at The Castro Theatre. Additionally, in partnership with the Colin Higgins Foundation, Frameline awarded Colin Higgins Youth Filmmaker Grants to franny trinidad andKelly Liu for Babaylan, Edward Nguyen for Sweat (Mồ Hôi) and Matthew Sorgie for So Be It. Ahead of the Festival’s Give Me the Ball! screening, the grantees were also recognized with awards.
He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Critics Choice Association (CCA), San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle (SFBAFCC) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.
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