Mardi Gras Film Festival

Queer Screen is Australia's premier LGBTQIA+ film organisation founded in 1993, with the main aim of reclaiming Sydney’s LGBTIQ+ film festival as owned and operated by the community. Highly regarded by filmmakers all over the world, Queer Screen is one of the most important platform for promoting LGBTIQ+ titles in this territory.

Queer Screen's Mardi Gras Film Festival has grown considerably since 1993. It is now one of Australia’s largest film festivals of any kind, and one of the top five queer film festivals in the world.

Since its inception the festival has featured the annual My Queer Career competition, a pioneering short film competition exclusively for locally produced LGBTIQ+ work. All Australian short film submissions are automatically under consideration for My Queer Career, and entrants are not required to maintain a Sydney Premiere.

Over the years My Queer Career has featured works from notable Australian filmmakers including Cate Shortland (Somersault, Black Widow), Adam Elliot (Harvey Krumpet, Memoir of a Snail), Sophie Hyde (52 Tuesdays, Good Luck to You, Leo Grande), Goran Stolevski (Of an Age, Housekeeping for Beginners), Julie Kalceff (First Day, Starting from...Now), Craig Boreham (Teenage Kicks, Lonesome) and Fadia Abboud (Here Out West, House of Gods).

Our Vision:
A celebration of the diversity of sexualities and gender identities through queer storytelling on screen, by inclusive and respectful communities full of creativity, inspiration and pride.

Our Mission:
To transform and engage individuals and communities through queer storytelling on screen.

About Queer Screen:
Since 1993 Queer Screen has continued to grow, now playing host to two annual film festivals: Queer Screen's Mardi Gras Film Festival (in February) and Queer Screen Film Fest (in August). It also offers a number of industry initiatives, including Australian short film competition My Queer Career (est. 1993), Queer Screen's Completion Fund (awarding over $162,000 AUD in funding to Australian filmmakers since 2016) and the short film pitching competition Pitch Off (awarding $60,000 AUD in funding since 2018).

To be notified when submissions for Queer Screen's Mardi Gras Film Festival and Queer Screen Film Fest open, you can join our filmmaker mailing list: https://queerscreen.org.au/filmmakers/join-the-filmmakers-list/