This weekend, Cincinnati’s premier LGBTQ+ film festival returns in a whole new way.
OutReels Cincinnati, a film festival founded in 2012 by David Wolff and Chuck Beatty, is moving to the Mariemont Theatre as part of its 15th anniversary. Previously, the festival took place at stage theaters like the Know Theatre and the Warsaw Incline; this year’s edition is the first time OutReels will take place at a dedicated movie theater, from Nov. 6 – 8.
Beatty, a Cincinnati native, conceived the idea for the festival after creating his own queer film in 2011.
“I produced a film to enter the Louisville LGBT Film Festival. Went there, experienced the festival, came back, but … I didn’t really want to travel, and realized we didn’t have a festival like that here,” he said. “So I reached out to other local festivals in Dayton and in Indianapolis to figure out how we could have one here in Cincinnati … I wanted to showcase other stories from the LGBT community.”
This year’s festival begins on Friday night at 7:30 p.m. with a screening of “Bookends,” a comedy-drama about the power of intergenerational relationships and how it’s never too late to start over. Saturday features an entire day of screenings: two Ohio-based documentaries, “Iden: A Story of Love” and “Free Beer Tomorrow,” followed by a queer version of Cyrano de Bergerac titled “Glitterbaited.”
Finally, Sunday will focus on LGBTQ+ history. Following a block of documentary shorts at 3 p.m., a discussion on local LGBTQ+ history will feature Lasse Lau, director of “Bachelors Only;” Jacob Hogue, author of “Cincinnati Before Stonewall: The Untold Queer History of the Queen City; Ron Clemons, writer and board member at the Buckeye Flame; and Avery Plummer, director of development and community engagement at the Ohio Lesbian Archives.
For Beatty, the festival’s move to the Mariemont Theatre is especially significant.
“That was one of the first places I saw a film as a kid. It’s not the most populated LGBT area, so I’m kind of curious to see what the turnout’s going to be. But to give people the accessibility to this kind of event is a different thing too. Because if they can’t or don’t want to travel downtown, they can just come to Mariemont and check out these films,” he said.
As one of the only truly independent film festivals left in the city, Beatty said that several people come up to him each year and tell him the films screened at OutReels changed their lives for the better.
“We’ve come a long way as a city, but I think we still have a way to go. Especially in the climate that we’re living in now, these stories are still being told. They still exist, so don’t think there isn’t any hope for for our community or the things that we’re doing. We’re not going to be lost anywhere,” Beatty said. “That’s why we have a film festival like this one to show that we’re still here, still telling our stories, still learning from the past and embracing that history to keep going.”
For more information on OutReels, visit the festival’s official website.
