"You can't curry love" Satrang South Asian Queer Film Festival

"It's only been just over a year since India's high court decrminalised homosexuality you know Ames," M says to me casually over brunch.

This is quite a serious start to coffee and eggs, but I am used to intriguing and fascinating conversations with my lovely mate M. He's extremely gorgeous, witty, talented- and yep you guessed it- completely out of my league.

We're about to choose what movie we're going to see. I wouldn't call us movies snobs by a long shot. (when Breaking Dawn was released we both celebrated like 16 year olds "I'm team Jacob" "Oh but Edward's so brooding") But when it comes to indie flicks or art house treasures, M has me sorted and always picks a winner- but we were struggling to find something good.

"Oh did I tell you about Dunno Y?  Apparently its the Indian Brokeback Mountain, its going to be the opening movie of our film fest," M says, again nonchalantly.

The Indian Brokeback Mountain! Four magic words and I wasn't interested in picking a movie anymore, I wanted to know more. 
M hadn't said anything to me about a film festival and I was clearly getting excited about the  possibility of seeing Indian cowboys.

But alas, Dunno Y...Na Jaane Kyun doesn't feature cowboys. However, it is Bollywood's first mainstream depiction of a gay relationship with even a 90 second kiss. Which by all accounts is broaching all sorts of taboos for the Indian film industry.    

Lucky for Sydney, the boundary pushing film is the opening movie for the second ever Sartang: South Asian Queer Film Festival. The movie's stars Kapil Sharma and Yuvraaj Parashar will also at the premier for Q and A after the premier.

The festival runs over the next two weekends, September 18-19 and September 25-26 at UTS and the program looks unreal!

Featuring films from,India, South Africa, UK, US, Australia and three films from Nepal, Satrang aims to celebrate and reflect queer life and movements in South Asia.

Other feature films showing during the festival are Shamim Sarif’s The WorldUnseen and I Can’t Think Straight, Sridhar Rangayan’s 68 Pages and director Nani Sarah Walker’s Other Nature.

I am paticulary excited about the short films on offer during the festival. You can't curry love from the U.S,  I think has the best film title ever and Finding Kamal, an Australian short about a young man running away from his family and moving in with three transgendered women are my picks of the shorts for the festival.


South Asian Queer Film Festival 
September 18, 19, 25 & 26
University of Technology
Book tickets here 



*images from google