Isabel Sandoval, Queer Palm 2023 juror: "To be queer, in my opinion, is to resist conformity"

After Señorita and Apparition, she gained notoriety in 2019, at the Venice Film Festival, with her third film Brooklyn Secret: the story of a white man in love with a transgender Filipino woman, in Donald Trump's America. Presented in more than 100 international festivals, the film has been dubbed by its peers, to become a reference in queer cinema. Today, Isabel Sandoval, transgender actress and director, herself from the Philippines and an immigrant to the United States, is experiencing a new recognition: from May 16 to 27, she will be a member of the jury of the Queer Palm at the Cannes Film Festival, which rewards films dedicated to sexual and gender diversity.

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Among the films in the running this year: Anatomy of a Fall by Justine Triet or The Return by Catherine Corsini. "It means that my point of view counts," she tells us ahead of the competition, chaired by American filmmaker John Cameron Mitchell. Because, finally, who better than her to help defend queer identity in cinema? Maintenance.

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Madame Figaro. - You have joined the new jury of the Queer Palm 2023. What does this award mean to you?
Isabel Sandoval. - The Queer Palm intends to get out of the canons of queer cinema, which would be limited to filming gay white men coming out of the closet or transgender people in transition. We saw this with Joyland (winner of the Queer Palm 2022, NLDR), which takes place for example in Pakistan. LGBTQI+ communities do not exist only in the West and we must reflect this reality. As a Filipino transgender filmmaker myself, participating in this award means that my point of view is legitimate and important.

What would be your definition of "queer"?
To be "queer", in my opinion, is to resist conformity and to exempt oneself from the mainstream. As an artist, it gives an infinite and very bold space for experimentation, based on challenging preconceptions. This often results in more agitated and adventurous works, which are the future of cinema.

By "agitated" and "adventurous" works, should we understand that this is what you expect from the films in the running this year?
I expect the exploration of identity, desire and the human to be as transgressive and personal in its substance as in its form. The more mainstream and conventional a queer film is – both aesthetically and ideologically – the more resistant I am to it.

To be "queer" is to resist conformity and to exempt oneself from the mainstream

Isabel Sandoval

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In Brooklyn Secret, a film you directed, you play the role of a transgender woman, in transition, in today's American society. How did you approach this subject?
Brooklyn Secret is a gesture of rebellion against certain clichés, precisely, that we find too often in cinema or television. The idea that transgender characters are hapless victims, made of trauma and misery. For my film, I wanted to see a heroine who had a power of action and a sense of dignity. A character with layers of complexity, not a symbol of oppression.

Do you think queer films are better represented today in film festivals?
The Queer Palm proves that there are real initiatives to give them more visibility. Especially since today, queer cinema no longer deals only with a person's sexual orientation, but with gender identity, which is one of the most important socio-cultural changes of the last decade.

In 2021, a report by the association SOS Homophobie recorded a 12% increase in crimes against LGBT+ people, in France, compared to 2019. Faced with this discrimination, is being a jury of the Queer Palm a militant act for you?
This award definitely showcased Joyland last year as an outstanding cinematic work, not as a gesture of kindness. The notoriety of the film led Pakistan, his country of origin, to look in the mirror regarding its position on queer identity (the film was banned in Pakistani cinemas, provoking the anger of queer communities in the country, Editor's note). This is a concrete and real example that the Queer Palm, by the films it chooses to reward in a thoughtful way, is a militant competition.

As such, can cinema have an impact on mentalities?
He can, if the political convictions he defends are whispered and not shouted. I think that when your film openly takes a certain political stance, you alienate yourself in an opposite camp. However, it is all in the nuance and in the subtlety. The better you know how to dose, the more you are able to reach people. Because no one likes to be lectured or lectured too head-on.

In cinema, political beliefs have to be whispered subtly, because no one likes to be lectured.

Isabel Sandoval

Besides the Queer Palm, what films are you looking forward to discovering at the Cannes Film Festival?
I'm very excited to see Jonathan Glazer's new film, especially since more than a decade has passed since Under The Skin, one of my favorite films. There are also Alice Rohrwacher's new films, The Chimera, and Martin Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon. Not to mention the new short films by Pedro Costa (Daughters of Fire) and Almodovar (Strange Way of Life).

Which jury member will you be?
I'll be fierce (laughs). In any case, I know what I like and I will defend it shamelessly!

The full list of works in the running for the Queer Palm 2023:

Feature film category:

• Anatomy of a Fall by Justine Triet
• The Return of Catherine Corsini
• Sam Levinson's The Idol
• Le Temps d'aimer by Katell Quillevéré
• How to Have Sex by Molly Manning
• Simple as Sylvain by Monia Chokri
• Rosalie by Stéphanie di Giusto
• Levante by Lillah Halla
• Conann by Bertrand Mandico
• A Prince by Pierre Creton
• Xiao Bai Chuan by Zihan Geng

Short film category:

• 27 by Flóra Anna Buda
• Strange Way of Life by Pedro Almodóvar
• Daroone Poust by Shafagh Abosaba & Maryam Mahdiye
• Bolero by Nans Laborde-Jourdaa
• Stranger by Jehnny Beth & Iris Chassaigne
• I saw Julia Kowalski's face of the devil
• Mast-Del by Maryam Tafakory