The Melbourne Queer Film Festival is the oldest, largest and most successful queer film festival in Australia. Our main festival screens over 100 sessions of LGBTQIA+ films over 11 days running through November.

The 2023 Melbourne Queer Film Festival will run from Nov 9 – Nov 19.

MQFF supports local and international filmmaking talent through our various Jury and audience choice awards. This includes the City of Melbourne Award for Best Australian Short which automatically qualifies the recipient for our nomination in the Iris Prize - the largest prize for a LGBTIQA+ short film in the world.

MQFF supports emerging local queer filmmakers through its Pitch, Pleez! competition. The $10,000 prize offers Australian LGBTIQA+ filmmakers the opportunity to create original content by assisting with the completion of a short film.

Films submitted for the annual Melbourne Queer Film Festival should be of interest to the LGBTQIA+ community (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer/questioning, intersex, asexual).

Short films submitted, if selected, may be programmed at the festival's discretion as part of MQFF's streaming on-demand offering, MQFF+, as well as in one or more of its in-cinema shorts programs. MQFF+ will only be accessible to Australian audiences.

Overall Rating
Quality
Value
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Hospitality
Networking
  • Alejandro Ayala

    Although I couldn't attend the festival because of the traveling costs, I know from people who were there that the projection of my short film "For Queen and Country" went beautifully. I'm very happy and honoured to have been part of the festival and I hope my work can be a part of future editions.

    December 2023
  • Angie Black

    MQFF is an incredibly well respected, run and attended international queer film festival held in Melbourne Australia. We were extremely proud to have our film WEEDLING (2023) selected as a Finalist Film and screen in the beautiful Capitol cinema. Can not recommend more highly.

    November 2023
  • Richard James Allen

    Here at The Physical TV Company in SYdney, we were honoured that Samuel Lucas Allen's CUT was a Finalist at MQFF's Australian Shorts & Awards. Congrats to all the nominees - it was an impressive lineup!

    November 2023
  • Such an incredible festival! It was an honour to have Equal the Contest selected and my experience working with the festival was seemless. Great communication, brilliant opportunities and positive strategic planning for audience engagement. I couldn't have been happier with the overall experience. Thanks to program director Cerise Howard and all at MQFF!

    November 2023
  • Jan Dunn

    MQFF is a great and welcoming festival and it was fantastic to have the world premiere of our short doc "Private View" at ACMI to a great crowd.

    December 2022