A Queer Review of the Austin Film Festival (2023)
Highlighting the many ways in which AFF 2023 illustrated that the queer experience is not a monolithic one.

Mezzo-soprano Aigul Akhmetshina headlines a winning ensemble as the feisty heroine, Rosina, alongside high-flying tenor Jack Swanson, in his Met debut, as her secret beloved, Count Almaviva. Baritone Andrey Zhilikhovsky stars as Figaro, the titular barber of Seville, with bass-baritone Peter Kálmán as Dr. Bartolo and bass Alexander Vinogradov as Don Basilio rounding out the principal cast.
Highlighting the many ways in which AFF 2023 illustrated that the queer experience is not a monolithic one.
The director's latest is a dreamlike exploration of a consciousness torn between two homelands, and the implications of history and memory suspended in limbo.
While the camera is objectifying her body to invoke a sexual response in male viewers, Lara Croft still defies the expectations of women in action films.
Facing the world with our fair share of uncertainties and/or apprehensions, many of which, sadly, may be well-founded, is nothing to sneeze at. Influenced and buffeted by the constant barrage of social media, fake news, and general upheaval present in our contemporary reality, what IS real and what's not becomes a blur.
This film manages to be simultaneously topical and timeless. Without being preachy, it highlights society’s flawed relationship with tech; insights into the complex ideas of family struggle are expertly dispersed among a perfectly paced and balanced story.
Desi’s “straight man” to Lucy’s playful exuberance subverted people’s expectations of what a Latino man could be and added respect and nuance to the way onscreen marriages between men and women were portrayed.