Among recent queer cinema features, festival circuit usual suspects and restored classics, it is now time to announce the Panorama strands of both events, and also the Special Screenings, which include the Opening and Closing Nights.

Opening honors of Queer Lisboa 28 go to “Baby”, the second feature film by Brazilian director Marcelo Caetano, a sexy and vibrant incursion into São Paulo’s underworld, weaving a delicate plot about love, family and loss. The film arrives directly from the Cannes Critics' Week, where Ricardo Teodoro won the award for breakthrough performance. “Call Me Agnes” will be the Closing Night film, a tender story halfway between a family comedy and a musical tale, starring performers from Indonesia, and on which director Daniel Donato worked for several years, developing fictional situations based on the real story of her friend and protagonist of the film, Agnes Geneva. Caetano, Donato and Geneva will be present at the festival to present their films.

Besides the Opening and Closing Nights, two more films will attract attention as Special Screenings. The first is a cult film from Brazilian cinema: “Onda Nova”, written by José Antonio Garcia and Ícaro Martins and featuring special appearances by Caetano Veloso and Regina Casé. Dating back to 1983, its recent restoration is world premiering now in Locarno, doing justice to this erotic and anarchic comedy about a women's soccer team formed during the Brazilian military dictatorship. Another special moment: the screening of the indie hit “I Saw the TV Glow”, directed by Jane Schoenbrun. After the success of “We're All Going To The World's Fair”, Schoenbrum delivers another iconic work, reaffirming themselves as one of the most powerful contemporary voices shaping the desires and anxieties of Generation Z.

In Panorama -strand dedicated to outstanding out-of-competition films-, there are also several noteworthy titles: the emotional “Close to You”, co-written and co-produced by Elliot Page, alongside director Dominic Savage, and in which Page stars as a trans man who returns to his family's small town for the first time in years; the explosive documentary “Teaches of Peaches”, about the feminist icon responsible for leaving an indelible mark on pop culture, full of archival materials, interviews and footage from the anniversary tour of her homonymous album; and Bruce LaBruce's most recent feature, “The Visitor”, premiered this year at the Berlinale, the Canadian director’s reinterpretation of Pasolini's “Theorem”, already crowned as one of his most provocative and political films. And also: Anthony Chen’s new film, starring Cynthia Erivo, “Drift”, which portrays the dramatic reality of the refugee crisis in the Mediterranean; “Hidden Master: the Legacy of George Platt Lynes”, a documentary that rescues the memory of the photographer who specialized in portraying celebrities, models and male nudes in the New York 30s and 40s; and finally, “Éviction”, a film where Mathilde Capone documents the eviction of a queer community from their home in the center of Montreal, and which will serve as the subject of a debate on the housing crisis and real estate speculation in Portugal.

“Onda Nova” will have a reprise screening at Queer Porto, this time as the Opening Night film, at Batalha, another opportunity to enjoy this cult film of Brazilian cinema. The Closing Night will feature the very surprising and outrageous Greek comedy “The Summer with Carmen”, premiered last year in Venice, and in which our “hero” is a public server, sexy and clumsy, displaying his nakedness throughout most of the film, and awarding us his emphasized existential dramas. And as a Special Screening, the documentary by director Justine Lemahieu about “As Fado Bicha”, a unique opportunity to get to know more closely, between concerts, dressing room conversations and intimate moments, the duo formed by João Caçador and Lila Tiago, who have shaked the Portuguese music scene with their unprejudiced reinterpretation of fado.

At Queer Porto’s Panorama, three bold documentaries. “The Disappearance of Shere Hite” is a thorough and appealing portrait of the feminist sexologist who shook the American establishment in 1976 by celebrating the female orgasm with her best-seller “The Hite Report”. “Lady Like”, an insight into the ups and downs of Lady Camden’s life, the renowned international drag celebrity and runner-up of RuPaul's Drag Race Season 14. And also “Si Je meurs, ce sera de joie”, an empathetic portrait of Micheline, Francis and Yves, leaders of the Greypride organization in Paris who want to revolutionize the lives of elder people by challenging stereotypes and judgments, while redefining notions of sex, love and aging in a current society marked by ageism and thanatophobia.

The competition strands, parallel activities, official guests and the remaining titles of the upcoming editions, will be announced on September 5 (Queer Lisboa) and September 12 (Queer Porto).