With news that a law banning the ‘promotion of homosexuality’ in Russia has passed its second reading, gay pride rallies being banned and officials saying they’re moving to ban foreign gay couple from adopting Russian babies, the massive country is certainly taking an increasingly homophobic course.

That’s now expanded to the LGBT film festival Bok o Bok (Side by Side), which started out in St. Petersberg but has since expanded to other cities, such as Moscow, Tomsk, Arkhangelsk, Perm and Novosibirsk. It has just been fined 500,000 rubles (about £10,000) after a judge ruled that it had taken donations from overseas, in contravention of a controversial new law.

The law says that any non Government organisation must register if they are in receipt of funding from foreigners. The organisers of Bok o Bok say they didn’t register because they haven’t received any foreign funding, and that the judge completely ignored them when they tried to argue they had not broken any laws.

Many are seeing this is yet more evidence of the Russian government trying to silence any dissent on their crackdown on homosexuality, and that the fine has been levied purely to try and stop the festival.

Russia is a signatory to the European Convention On Human Rights, with the organisation’s court telling them they must move away from stigmatising gay people. However the government has ignored this, and even claimed they have international or European commitment to preventing gay rights abuses.

LA’s Outfest is generally considered the world’s premier gay film festival. Now the full line-up for this year’s fest, which runs July 11th-21st. Here the release letting us know what festival goers will be able to see:

Los Angeles, June 6, 2013 – Outfest – the Los Angeles-based nonprofit organization that promotes equality by creating, sharing, and protecting LGBT stories on the screen – has announced the complete programming lineup for its 31st Outfest Los Angeles LGBT Film Festival. The nation’s leading LGBT festival will be held July 11 to 21, 2013.

As previously announced, Outfest 2013 will open with Kyle Patrick Alvarez’s “C.O.G.,” based on the short story by David Sedaris, on Thursday, July 11. Prior to the opening night screening, the organization will honor writer-director Kimberly Peirce with its 17th annual Achievement Award.

The festival closes on Sunday, July 21, with Darren Stein’s comedy “G.B.F.,” written by Outfest Screenwriting Lab Fellow George Northy, and starring Megan Mullally, Natasha Lyonne and Andrea Bowen.

Other gala screenings include: “Pit Stop” (U.S. Dramatic Centerpiece), Yen Tan’s quietly powerful Sundance darling, in which the Outfest alum provides an evocative glimpse into the lives of two Southern gay men; veteran Brazilian filmmaker Bruno Barreto returns with “Reaching for the Moon” (International Dramatic Centerpiece), a steamy tale of an unlikely romance between two extraordinary lesbian artists, set against the backdrop of political upheaval and a clash of cultures; ”God Loves Uganda” (Documentary Centerpiece), in which Academy Award–winner Roger Ross Williams provides powerful insight into the ignorance (cloaked in religion) exported by the United States to the rest of the world; and Pratibha Parmar‘s “Alice Walker: Beauty in Truth” (Fusion Centerpiece), a compelling and inspirational documentary about Alice Walker’s extraordinary journey from sharecropper’s daughter to activist, journalist, poet and Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist of The Color Purple.

“Our line-up celebrates a powerful new generation of storytellers, as well as Outfest alumni and veteran filmmakers, who pave the way to an even brighter future for the LGBT community,” says Kirsten Schaffer, Executive Director of Outfest. “This year’s program confirms Outfest as a leader in LGBT rights and cultural expression, ensuring that our stories are created, shared and protected.”

Other highly anticipated titles in this year’s festival include Travis Mathews and James Franco’s “Interior. Leather Bar.”, a provocative re-imagining of the lost 40 minutes of “Cruising”; the James Franco-produced documentary “Kink,” in which director Christina Voros takes us into the painful but oh-so-pleasurable world of five San Francisco–based BDSM workers; Linda Bloodworth Thomason’s award-winning “Bridegroom,” a powerful and poignant feature about love, loss and the courage of one young man to stand up for same-sex equality; Jeffrey Schwarz’s “I Am Divine,” a documentary about the legendary drag performer Divine; “The Battle of amFAR,” a triumphant short film by Outfest Achievement Award winners Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, which focuses on the landmark AIDS advocacy group; and world premieres of “Igloo,” the feature film directorial debut by Chilean actor Diego Ruiz, and Del Shores’ hilarious and heartbreaking screen adaptation of his hit play “Southern Baptist Sissies“.

“The films in this year’s festival feature a variety of heroes and role models from around the world who fought tenaciously to create a more enlightened society. These movies highlight the humanity, hilarity and honesty of the LGBT community,” said Director of Programming Kristin Pepe (KP).

The Ford Amphitheatre will once again host the Under the Stars series, kicking off with our annual sing-along, featuring the hit musical comedy “Pitch Perfect,” starring Anna Kendrick and Rebel Wilson. Other screenings include the sexy and provocative “Test“; “Hot Guys with Guns,” a hilarious thriller that marks the debut of actor Doug Spearman (“Noah’s Arc”) as writer-director; the Hitchcock-inspired thriller “Breaking the Girls,” directed by Outfest alum Jamie Babbit and written by Guinevere Turner (“American Psycho”); as well as the Closing Night Gala “G.B.F.” directed by Darren Stein (“Jawbreaker”). This event is part of the Ford Theatres 2013 Summer Season, a multi-disciplinary arts series produced by the Los Angles County Arts Commission in cooperation with Los Angeles County. For a complete Ford Summer Season schedule, directions to the theatre and parking information, visit www.FordTheatres,org

This year, Outfest is proud to feature three graduates of the annual Outfest Screenwriting Lab that are returning to the festival as completed motion pictures: U.S. Centerpiece “Pit Stop” by Yen Tan and David Lowery, “Hot Guys with Guns” by Doug Spearman and Closing Night Gala “G.B.F.” by George Northy.

As part of its Outfest Forward program, Outfest will present OutSet shorts – a screening of five short films written, produced and directed by a new generation of storytellers, the 2013 graduates of OutSet, the Young Filmmakers Project from LifeWorks and Outfest, created to empower and educate LGBTQ youth to tell their stories through film.

Five in Focus: Outfest spotlights the exciting new talent, on both sides of the camera, behind a quintet of powerful films. The 2013 selections include: Drew Denny (Writer-Director-Actress, “The Most Fun I’ve Ever Had with My Pants On”), Stacie Passon (Writer-Director, “Concussion”), Lisa Biagiotti (Journalist-Filmmaker, “Deepsouth”), Michael Mayer (Writer-Director, “Out in the Dark”) and Rhys Ernst & Zackary Drucker (Filmmakers-Artists, “She Gone Rogue”).

For more information and for a complete listing of films in the Festival, log on to www.outfest.org/fest2013 [Read more…]

Director Matt Riddlehoover’s Scenes From A Gay Marriage gained a lot of fans when it was released in the US at the end of last year (it certainly didn’t hurt that it was filled with very sexy guys). Now Matt’s been in touch with us to let us know the exciting news that a sequel to the movie is in development.

Riddlehoover and Shane Bartlett of Bring Chase Productions will produce the sequel, tentatively titled Scenes from a Gay Marriage 2. Gay movie luminary Charlie David (Dante’s Cove, Mulligans, Judas Kiss) has joined the cast, with Scenes From A Gay Marriage’s Jared Allman and Thashana McQuiston back to co-star.

Shooting dates have not yet been determined, but it is likely filming will begin before the end of the year. Riddlehoover’s latest, West Hollywood Motel, is to be released later this year through TLAgay.com.