Denver’s CinemaQ festival turns 18
DENVER — Keith Garcia is a familiar face among Denver cinephiles. You may know him from film festivals or the Sie FilmCenter, where he acts as artistic director and reminds us all to turn off our phones before the movie starts. He’s also the founder of Denver’s only queer film festival, CinemaQ, which takes over the Sie FilmCenter this weekend for three days of film centering the LGBTQ+ community.
The festival, hosted by Denver Film at the Sie FilmCenter, features 13 feature films, a collection of short films, as well as community conversations and a marketplace. Garcia runs the festival, selecting each year’s lineup in search of the best of the best.
“This festival only has so many slots, so we really try to highlight original stories and storytellers,” Garcia said, who has to whittle the dozens of submissions down to the few coveted spots. “No frills, no fat.”
This year’s lineup features the Olivia Wilde-led film “I Want Your Sex,” comedian John Early’s directorial debut with “Maddie’s Secret,” and the moving “The Dads,” which chronicles a group of fathers of transgender and nonbinary children facing discrimination. Outside of film screenings, there’s also a Saturday morning cartoon watch party, community conversation around conversion therapy and its effects, and a marketplace featuring local vendors.
CinemaQ is a product of Garcia’s longtime efforts to bring more queer films to the Colorado community. It started with Garcia programming a monthly queer film at the Sie.
The monthly series is where the name CinemaQ came from, eventually turning into a successful recurring program at the movie theater. Sitting on a large backlog of queer films but only one slot a month, Garcia had the thought to create a full festival.
“We had so many queer films that weren’t playing but definitely had the audience for it,” Garcia said. “And here we are all those years later.”
When asked about themes of this year’s festival, Garcia answered plainly — survival stories.
“With the current state of politics and general attitude toward queerness, we’re seeing a lot of stories about resilience and rising above challenging circumstances,” Garcia said, pointing to the festival’s sold-out opening night film “Leviticus.” The film follows two teenage boys who undergo a “disturbing conversion ritual which unknowingly releases a violent entity that terrorizes the town.”
A Colorado native, Garcia recalls a very early recognition of his own queer identity, even if he didn’t fully understand the scope. He cites “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” and “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown” as foundational films in his life.
He has worked with Denver Film for 22 years. Over the years of CinemaQ, Garcia has seen the biggest growth in audience numbers.
“Despite what some might think, there’s definitely a large appetite for queer film, even with everything going on,” Garcia said.
Colorado houses more than 20 film festivals across the state, including Sundance Film Festival in its new home of Boulder.
William LaBahn, who is CinemaQ’s presenting sponsor and primary funding partner, helps make this festival possible and has done so for the past eight years. A member of an old Hollywood family, LaBahn said film is in his blood; his grandparents ran a film studio in the 1920s. As a filmmaker himself, as well as lifelong fan of the medium, LaBahn said contributing to CinemaQ was the best possible way to continue the family legacy of film.
“As a gay man in this community, I really felt like I needed to give back,” LaBahn said. “Making sure that something like CinemaQ can live on is the best possible way I could do that.”
LaBahn lives in the mountains full-time. He attended Colorado State University and has lived in the state ever since. While he spends a lot of time in Los Angeles for his own projects and other work, he always looks forward to coming back to Colorado, specifically to Denver for the film festivals. LaBahn believes Colorado is well on its way to becoming a recognized film hub, even if some people don’t realize it quite yet.
“I talk to people in other cities about Colorado film all the time,” LaBahn said. “Colorado can still be seen as a flyover state, but I think people are recognizing what we’re doing here in a new way.”
LaBahn points to PeeWee Herman as a foundational queer character, reflecting on how far queer cinema has come over the years and feels optimistic about the future.
“I think queer film is just getting better and better,” LaBahn said. “We’re even seeing more diversity among queer filmmakers and topics, which is the goal.”
Garcia and LaBahn hope the community comes out to enjoy queer film during the festival’s 18th year. Tickets are still available for many of the screenings, which you can browse here.
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