Queer Nights in Palestine
Cinema Queer x Skånes konstförening
21 dec, 16.00–19.00
Organised together with Queers for Palestine Malmö

With: Fateema Al-Hamaydeh Miller, Roy Dibs, Hadi Moussally, Jocelyne Saab, Elias Wakeem

In connection with Kortfilmsdagen (The Short Film Day), Skånes konstförening invites you to a fundraising and film program in solidarity with the Palestinian people and their right to freedom and peace. During the evening, we present a collection of queer stories set against the backdrop of Palestine and the wider Middle East, selected by Cinema Queer. Exploring the connection between queer and Palestinian liberation, the films show how these struggles against oppression intertwine. Each film explores the depth of themes related to identity, love, longing and resistance.

Program
16.00 The event starts
16.30–18.00 Screenings
18.00–19.00 Café

Language: Arabic, English, French, Turkish, all screened with English subtitles
Fika will be provided

The event is free of charge but please donate to the Palestinagruppernas emergency fundraising for Gaza. Read more here. Swish: 1239011578.

The movies in the program

EITR (14 mins)
Fateema Al-Hamaydeh Miller, 2022
14 mins

A closeted Arab wholesale perfume seller, attempting to mask his identity with excessive amounts of Polo Sport adjacent cologne, is knocked off center when a charming customer sees through his act.

Mondial 2010 (19:17 mins)
Roy Dibs, 2013

Lebanese artist Roy Dib presents an impossible love story between two men. His is a road movie that explores the institutional borders of the modern day Middle East

Le règne de Sultana (9:53 mins)
Hadi Moussally, 2023

Sultana of New York is a Palestinian drag queen, performer, and artist. While being painted by Jordanian artist RIDIKKULUZ, Sultana reflects on her journey from Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon to New York. She tells of the challenges of performing drag in conservative societies, her nostalgia for the glory days of Egyptian cinema icons, and her struggle for her right to existence and self-expression.

Gender Café (26:53 mins )
Jocelyne Saab, 2013

Six 4-minute short films each filmed in the countries of the Mediterranean, and dealing with expressions of gender, the body, sexuality and identity. Six interviews with artists or people talking about these thorny issues makes for a geographical impression, a suffering body, subject to violence, repression and inhibition.

Homecoming Queenz (11:25 mins)
Elias Wakeem, 2019

This is a live performance shot by smartphones and was taken at Ben Gurion International Airport while on the way back from abroad. Through the act the artist is collaborating with Oz Marinov and they try to pass through the border with a unique clothing.


Cinema Queer is Sweden’s largest international LGBTQ film festival, taking place in Stockholm, annually, during the last week of September. Cinema Queer was founded in 2012 with a mission to broaden the heteronormative cinematic selection in Sweden, as well as to offer Stockholm audiences a wide range of queer film.

Cinema Queer focuses on films that question, discuss, and isn’t limited to existing norms while highlighting stories that otherwise wouldn’t be recognised. The aim is to create an accesible platform for LGTBQ film in Sweden, for both international and Swedish film makers and film lovers. During the year Cinema Queer showcase several special screenings, during events such as Stockholm Pride and Short Film Day (Kortfilmsdagen).

Kortfilmsdagen (The Short Film Day) is an annual event on the shortest day of the year, 21 December, celebrating the short format through film screenings organised by various organisers around the country. Celebrated since 2011 by France’s Centre national du cinéma et de l’image animée, Short Film Day was launched in Sweden in 2014 by the Swedish Film Institute, and since 2018 it has been project managed by Folkets Bio as part of Svensk Kortfilm c/o Folkets Bio.

Photo: Hadi Moussally, Le règne de Sultana (video still), 2023.