The XPOSED Queer Film Festival Berlin is proud to announce its 20th anniversary, presenting the festival’s most extensive edition to date. This milestone celebration will feature a rich array of programs, including a retrospective, exhibitions, and performances, along with a complete visual rebranding for 2026.
What began two decades ago as an experimental film night in a gay club has transformed into a vibrant festival held across seven Berlin cinemas and various community spaces, all while staying true to its original mission: to showcase films that might not find a platform elsewhere, fostering a sense of belonging and connection for queer individuals.
This anniversary is not only an occasion to revel in the past but also an opportunity to reflect on the transformations that have transpired over the past 20 years. Queer narratives have gained visibility in cinema, becoming more accessible; however, increased representation often intertwines with commercialisation, blurring crucial distinctions. Despite these advancements, queer lives remain precarious and threatened globally, including in Germany.
A Song Without Home ©Rati Tsiteladze, ArtWay FilmAmidst this backdrop, XPOSED continues to embrace cinema as a space of resistance. The festival invites audiences to remain vigilant, showcasing challenging imagery, open narratives, and the communities that emerge around them. XPOSED transcends mere programming; it embodies a temporarily shared space, sustained by filmmakers, participants, and audiences alike.
The 20th edition of XPOSED will feature 15 new feature films and 59 new short films from around the globe, encompassing a diverse range of genres and experimental forms from both small independent productions and major festival winners.
Several films address themes of alienation and emancipation. A Song Without Home tells the poignant story of a young trans woman who escapes her Georgian village after years of imprisonment, seeking a new life in Vienna. The documentary Mea Culpa reveals, primarily through phone conversations, the complicated relationship between a mother in Lebanon and her gay son in Belgium. Whipping Hair! follows the thrilling life of Brazilian drag performer Márcia Pantera, known for her electrifying shows.
SUCH-FEELING Ivo KrankowskiAdditionally, many films explore queer parenthood, with the German film Familiar Places spotlighting director Mala Reinhardt’s best friend Akousa, who dreams of having a child but is uncertain about the form a queer family may take.
Coming from Cambodia/Hong Kong and the USA, reflexive films delve into performative role-playing, such as Whisperings of the Moon, where a young theater actress returns to Phnom Penh after her father’s death and reunites with a former lover, bringing their shared past to the stage. The animated film Bouchra navigates the emotional and creative journey of a Moroccan filmmaker between Casablanca and New York, oscillating between autonomy and belonging.
The program also showcases four films highlighting solidarity within queer communities, alongside themes of grief and friendship. Such Feeling from Poland portrays a queer artist group in Warsaw, while Cactus Fruits from India narrates the story of a young man who returns to his village after his father’s death, reconnecting with both family and childhood friends during the mourning period. In Black Burns Fast from South Africa, a 17-year-old boarding school student grapples with first love, societal prejudices, and social media, while in The Crowd from Iran, a group bids farewell to a friend planning to leave the country with a lively festival, despite their sorrow.
Short films present a significant theme of resistance: Lazaro’s Temptation critiques muscular culture and toxic masculinity in Brazil; Thunder Bird follows a queer theatre troupe on their tour in Myanmar; What You Will Do When the War Continues? examines the impact of militarisation on queer life in Ukraine; Scorpionikas portrays dissident sex workers in Brazil; Cairo Streets offers a vibrant essay on Egyptian cinema and imagined love; and in Taxi Moto, this year’s Teddy Award winner for Best Short Film, a Rwandan director crafts an entire film set for a queer love story that was not permitted in his home country.
The film program has been curated by Kareem Jamaal Baholzer, David Bakum, Merle Groneweg, Pol Merchan, and Sarnt Utachamote.
Taxi MotoLooking Beyond Boundaries
To celebrate its anniversary, XPOSED will present a retrospective reflecting on 20 years of radical curation. From its inception, the festival has challenged narrow definitions of queerness, actively seeking out films that question both formal and content boundaries. Just as concepts of queerness evolve, so too do the methods of queer storytelling.
From May 21 to 24, the Sinema Transtopia will host two feature films and six short film programs, selected by six former and current XPOSED curators—founder Bartholomew Sammut, Michael Stütz, Merle Gronewald, Pol Merchan, Thomas Schallhart, and Nastaran Tajeri-Foumani—who have chosen films that resonate with lasting artistic and political significance.
The retrospective will open on May 21 at 18:00 in Sinema Transtopia with the short film program “A Collective Becoming,” celebrating the power of collaborative creation through films that turn solidarity and shared vision into a truly transformative force.
Among the 40 works from 24 production countries are animation and documentary films, fiction, and hybrid forms, with a robust representation of short films including Blue Boy, Flores del Otro Patio, Carrotica, Passage, Wild Patience Has Taken Me Here, Badlands, When the Androgynous Child, Etage X, Pier 34 New York, Summer 83, and I’ve Heard Stories. Also featured is a classic lesbian science fiction film from Austria: Rote Ohren fetzen durch Asche.
XPOSED XPANDED
For the first time, XPOSED will also serve as an exhibition space. Three exhibitions featuring video works and VR installations will reflect artistically on the films and programs showcased at the festival over the past 20 years. From May 21 to 31, daily from 15:00 to 21:00, the exhibition “The screen has accidentally, intentionally, been left blank” will be on view at the Aquarium, while Live from home and Follow their footsteps will be displayed at the Vierten Welt from May 21 to June 14 (Thursdays to Sundays from 16:00 to 21:00).
XPOSED has also invited filmmakers and artists who have contributed to previous editions to rethink, reinterpret, or stage their cinematic works as interactive cinema performances. The performance program at Sinema Transtopia explores how queer practices subvert the traditional film screen, transforming it into a space for performance, interaction, and exchange, blurring the boundaries between filmmakers, protagonists, and audiences.
A Platform for Radical, Experimental Queer Cinema
In celebration of its 20th anniversary, XPOSED reveals a new logo and a revamped website, positioning itself as an international platform for radical, experimental queer cinema. This rebranding honours the diverse forms, communities, and cinematic languages that the festival has embraced over the past two decades while looking forward. The new visual identity of the festival plays with light, distortion, and visibility, creating space for the interplay between history and evolving queer communities.
The program for the 20th XPOSED Queer Film Festival is now available online at xposedfilmfestival.com.
