As the 2026 edition is in full swing, GAZE Festival Director and Manager, Sam Ahern, shares some of their favourite picks from this year’s programme.
We head into the 34th Edition of GAZE International LGBTQIA Film Festival with five sold-out screenings – including two screenings of Lesbian Lines directed by Cara Holmes, Kate Dolan’s Soulm8te, Pedro Almodóvar’s Bitter Christmas and Stop! That! Train! the new RuPaul-led feature from Hairspray director Adam Shankman.
It’s a beautiful note to start the festival week, with lots of buzz and excitement around the programme – in particular surrounding Irish film! – and the good news is, there’s so much more to see. As GAZE kicks off, I wanted to share some of my favourites of this year’s programme, and give you a chance to discover some pure gems.
At The Place of Ghosts
Two-spirit Mi’kmaq director Bretten Hannam opened the festival in 2022 with their feature Wildhood. The director’s second feature is a captivating story about two brothers who make a journey through a forest, where time folds in on itself, revealing ancestral spirits, past and future, in order to confront their violent upbringing. It’s a visually arresting work with profound moments examining how the Mi’kmaq people relate to the land. Tickets here.
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Joy Boy: A Tribute To Julius Eastman
In collaboration with aemi, Joy Boy: A Tribute to Julius Eastman sees six filmmakers come together to pay cinematic tribute to the transcendent music, queer activism and vibrant spirituality of African American composer, performer and activist Julius Eastman. What’s incredibly moving is the filmmakers’ deep relationship not just to Eastman’s work, but the intention and ethos with which he approached his life. A remarkable ode, with co-director Victoire Karera Kampire in attendance for a post-screening Q&A. Tickets here.
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Barbara Forever
Long-standing audiences of the festival will fondly remember seasons and screenings of Hammer’s lauded work, including Dyketactics and Nitrate Kisses. This documentary captures the lesbian film pioneer’s life entirely through her own archival goldmine of queer cinema history. Avante-garde and relentlessly rejected by a patriarchally guarded artistic scene being slowly revolutionised by movements of the 70s and 80s, Hammer’s sheer perseverance blasted through a glass ceiling of cultural gatekeepers, immortalising herself and the lovers she so tenderly and prolifically captured throughout her work. Tickets here.
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Trial of Hein
Hein returns to his home island after being away for 14 years. When the locals don’t recognise him, the town elder hosts a trial to determine whether or not he is the island’s prodigal son. Director Kai Stänicke’s finely-tuned script and restrained design tease folk horror in this contemporary social allegory. The director will be in attendance for a post-screening Q&A, thanks to the Goethe Institut. Tickets here.
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The Serpent’s Skin
The sixth feature from 21-year-old Australian director Alice Maio Mackay is a stylish homage to 90s and 00s genre film and TV. The film is a Buffy, True Blood and Twilight-inspired trans romance, edited by Vera Drew and produced by Louise Weard, which we are delighted to present in partnership with TITE. When Anna (Alexandra McVickey) moves from her hometown, she meets goth tattoo artist Gen (Avalon Fast). The two are led to each other through shared supernatural abilities. As their romance blossoms, Gen inadvertently summons a demon through a neck tattoo she gives Anna’s neighbour and ex-lover, Danny. The Serpent’s Skin is the culmination of Mackay’s neo-Araki aesthetic that has made her one of the most exciting voices in the new wave of independent trans cinema. Tickets here.
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Jaripeo
Filmmaker Efraín Mojica travels to their hometown in Penjamillo, Michoacán, with friend and co-director Rebecca Zweig, revealing the homo-erotic nature of the local rodeos (or ‘jaripeos’) and the steamy counter-culture that exists after hours. Mojica navigates their own and local reflections on masculinity, offering an open-hearted understanding of the effects of secrecy in shaping identity. The emotional core of the film comes from Mojica’s frank conversations with Zweig and local fans and participants. Tickets here.
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On The Road
This tense and seductive Mexican thriller from acclaimed director David Pablos won both the Queer Lion and the Horizons Award at the Venice Film Festival. Presented in collaboration with Queer Spectrum Film Festival, On The Road follows sex worker Veneno, who is abandoned at a roadside stop after a truck driver refuses to pay him, before finding a lift with the closeted trucker Muñeco. As they travel across Mexico’s stark highways and neon-lit rest stops, a charged mix of desire and unease grows between them. Gradually, Veneno’s dangerous past comes into focus, while Muñeco struggles to confront his own inner turmoil. The film unfolds as a gripping road story where longing, risk, and vulnerability collide, leading to a striking finale filled with both heartbreak and tenderness. Tickets here.
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Finally, we’re very excited to present a focus on queer Brazilian film in this year’s GAZE programme through the following screenings:
New Brazilian Shorts
From pop idols and capoeira legends of the eighties to the technofuturist witches of New Rio, exploring home, migration, music and magic, this short film block mirrors the Brazilian community’s vibrant contributions to Irish culture, celebrating the diversity, artistry and power in new Brazilian cinema. Tickets here.
The Passion According To G.H.B.
In partnership with Gay Health Network and Poz Vibe Tribe, this genre-bending film introduces us to Matias as he invites Grindr hookups to an apartment-sit in rainy São Paulo, connecting over kinks, chemsex, HIV status and classic literature. This post-pandemic magical realist gay bedroom odyssey, including unsimulated sex, is told in largely vérité-style with unvarnished honesty and compassion. With a post-screening discussion with Luis Noguera Benitez and Prateek Bhardwaj. Tickets here.
Find the full programme for GAZE International LGBTQIA Film Festival 2026 here.
© 2026 GCN (Gay Community News). All rights reserved.
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