“Patrik” Wins Frameline Accolades at World’s Largest LGBT Fest

A scene from Ella Lemhagen's "Patrik, Age 1.5." Image courtesy of Frameline.

San Francisco’s Frameline concluded its festival over the weekend, capping the event’s 33rd festival with Swedish director Ella Lemhagen’s “Patrik, Age 1.5” winning the audience award for best feature film. The film is the story of Sven and Goran, a suburban married gay couple who relocate to adopt a child, only to be surprised to find that their 1.5-year-old baby Patrik is in fact 15-years- old and a homophobe.

Directors Dee Mosbacher and Fawn Yacker won the fest’s audience award for best documentary for “Training Rules,” which chronicles Penn State women’s basketball coach Rene Portland’s homophobic coaching philosophy that “wrecked the lives and dreams of many talented young players.” Best short film, meanwhile, went to LUCHA, directed by Maria Breaux, in which two women struggle to find love and resistance amidst El Salvador’s 1982 civil war.

Frameline, the world’s oldest and largest LGBT film festival, opened with Richard Laxton’s “An Englishman in New York and closed with “Hannah Free” by Wendy Jo Carlton. “Patrik 1.5” screened as Frameline’s centerpiece. This year’s guest list included Rosie O’Donnell, Sharon Gless and Chad Allen in addition to Jill Marie Jones from “Dare” and Laura Harring from “Mulholland Drive.” Warhol superstar Joe D’Allesandro, star and subject of doc “Little Joe” also joined the festivities.

Frameline33’s annual Frameline Award for excellence in LGBT filmmaking went to legendary experimental directors George and Mike Kuchar, whose careers and antics were documented in Jennifer Kroot’s “It Came from Kuchar.” On hand to give out the award was filmmaker Christopher Coppola.

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