From the Wicked Queer Archives

Explore our Archive from 1984-89!

Wicked Queer is proud to announce that our website now has the full programs online from the first five editions of Boston's LGBTQ+ film festival. The films are an amazing mix of Queer stories from around the world, early indies, new Hollywood, camp classics, underground trash cinema, and just a little bit of X-rated material.

George Mansour started the festival in 1984, when he was the programmer for the arthouse Nickelodeon Theater on Commonwealth Ave (after having previously programming various porn theaters in the city). The festival's first year was at the Nickelodeon, before moving to the Orson Welles Cinema in Cambridge in 1985. The Orson Welles burned down a week before the festival in 1986, but it returned at the Nickelodeon in 1987 and 1988. Lore has it that Boston University didn't appreciate having the festival on their campus during graduation, and it was moved to the Somerville Theater in 1989.

We were able to reconstruct these programs from the online archives for the Gay Community News at Northeastern University and the Boston Phoenix at the Internet Archive, looking through ads, reviews, interviews, and cinema showtimes to trace our history through these now-discontinued local weekly publications. We are grateful for the work of the archivists who have made it possible for us to look back in time on our history.

The festival would continue to change in the 1990s, thanks to the arrival of New Queer Cinema, video art and artists, movies about the AIDS crisis... but that's a story for another day, when even more of our archives are online.

For now, we encourage you to explore the archive, widen your view of Queer film history, and find a few new festival picks from the 80s to add to your watch list:

And if you happen to have print programs or other materials from the festival from the 1990s or 2000s, please drop us a line at hello@wickedqueer.org to help us expand our archive!

You can support the efforts of Wicked Queer by making a tax-deductible donation today, or get involved and become a festival volunteer!

Wicked Queer returns for our 41st year April 4-15, 2025. Final deadline for submissions is January 31. Stay tuned for program announcements, ticketing, and more!

Wicked Queer is on BlueSky! Follow us at @wickedqueer.boston

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