Media Representation In Elie Chivi's 'Inside Out'

Inside Out is an annual Queer film festival based in Toronto that showcases current 2SLGBTQ+ cinema from around the world. The festival, which was founded in 1990 (Anderson 41), has become a major cultural event, attracting thousands of film enthusiasts, activists, and community members year-round. The Queer festival circuit offers a unique perspective on the intersection of contemporary media and activism, as well as the evolution of 2SLGBTQ+ media representation. Furthermore, Inside Out provides insight into the barriers between heteronormative mainstream cinema and Queer media, which is often framed as a distinctly niche market. In 1991, Inside Out was originally founded by a group of activists as the Toronto Lesbian and Gay Film and Video

In our interview, Elie Chivi discusses some of these transformations, including the community’s particular focus on Queer joy, ethical issues surrounding the casting of 2SLGBTQ+ characters, as well as tokenizing portrayals of Queer individuals. To begin, Inside Out’s 2023 programming clearly celebrates Queer Joy with an emphasis on empowerment. When the market becomes oversaturated with portrayals of Queer individuals who are assaulted, killed, or commit suicide by the film’s end, certain disempowering narratives become status quo. This is not to say that the struggles of 2SLGBTQ+ individuals are not worth exploring on screen, but that strictly confining Queer stories to tragic tropes such as unrequited love, loneliness, and tragic endings is an issue that has come into public discourse. In what is now referred to as “tragedy porn”, 2SLGBTQ+ characters are often framed as powerless against the forces of queerphobia and heteronormativity. However, as noted by Chivi, the “focus on Queer love and Queer joy” is a significant development in the representation of the 2SLGBTQ+ community as “there is this pushing back against the misery of it all” (Chivi). These nuanced storylines consider 2SLGBTQ+ individuals as more than the hardship they face. As society becomes more accepting and inclusive of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities, Queer

While some notable exceptions include Brokeback Mountain (2005) and Love, Simon (2018), Queer films that break into the mainstream are often criticized for sanitizing the Queer experience with the aim of making it digestible for straight and cis audiences. In other words, these Queer films are not even made for Queer people, but are instead designed and marketed to appeal to mass audiences by major distributors. This reinforces the idea that Queer films cannot be both authentically Queer and accessible to all audiences. That being said, there is this notion that Queer stories are “niche and that [they] are not exactly meant for mass consumption, but [these] stories are universal,” as Chivi puts it (Chivi). This societal attitude has significant consequences on the production and marketing of Queer media, as well as festivals like Inside Out. In fact, some filmmakers refuse to screen their work at Queer festivals altogether as if doing so would suggest that their work is only relevant to Queer audiences. This phenomenon is discussed in the Canadian Journal of Film Studies as the Queer “ghetto” (Andersen 42). From a business perspective, some filmmakers are concerned that by partnering with festivals like Inside Out, they become confined to what is widely perceived as a niche market, “thus cutting short the potential market” (Andersen 42). On this topic, Elie Chivi states