Filmgoers are heading back to Fort Worth’s Q Cinema from 13 to 15 November 2026, as the LGBTQ+ festival returns for its 30th anniversary after a six-year break. At Amphibian Stage in the Near Southside, the weekend brings international features, shorts, documentaries and filmmaker conversations together in an intimate setting.

Essential takeaways

  • A landmark return: Q Cinema is back for its 30th anniversary, after a six-year hiatus.
  • Three days of films: The festival runs from 13 to 15 November at Amphibian Stage in Fort Worth’s Near Southside.
  • A varied programme: Audiences can expect features, documentaries, shorts, retrospectives and regional films, with conversations and community events.
  • Three headline films: Bookends opens the festival, Clarissa screens on Saturday, and Jaripeo closes the weekend.
  • Ticket options: The advertised prices are $125 for a festival pass and $20 for an individual ticket.

Q Cinema is back, and the timing feels right

After six years away, Fort Worth’s Q Cinema is returning with a programme built around LGBTQ+ stories and the people who bring them to the screen. The setting is Amphibian Stage, where an intimate 100-seat theatre becomes a close-up space for films, conversation and community.

The 30th-anniversary festival runs from 13 to 15 November 2026. Trinity Pride Fort Worth is producing the event, which brings international features, documentaries, shorts and regional work to the Near Southside. It’s a welcome reminder that a film festival can be more than a run of screenings: it can give a community a place to gather and see its stories reflected.

A festival with Fort Worth roots

Q Cinema was founded in 1996 by Todd Camp and Shawn Moore. Now stewarded by Trinity Pride Fort Worth, it’s entering a new chapter as a curated, non-competitive festival, with a programme that spans established filmmakers and emerging voices.

The range matters. Alongside feature films, the weekend includes shorts, documentaries, retrospectives, filmmaker conversations and community events. For local audiences, that mix offers more than a chance to catch a film; it creates room to talk about what’s on screen and the lives behind it.

Three headline films, three different worlds

Friday’s opening film, Bookends, follows Nate, played by Noam Ash, as a painful breakup takes him from city life to his grandparents’ retirement community. F. Murray Abraham and Caroline Aaron play Saul and Miriam, while Charlie Barnett appears as the doctor who becomes an unexpected romantic interest. The film is directed by Mike Doyle, and the screening is followed by a conversation with Ash and Doyle.

Saturday’s feature, Clarissa, moves Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway into contemporary Lagos. Sophie Okonedo plays Clarissa, whose preparations for a party bring old relationships and past choices back into view; David Oyelowo and Ayo Edebiri are also among the cast. It’s a fresh setting for a story about memory, time and the lives people carry with them.

Sunday closes with Jaripeo, a documentary set around traditional Mexican rodeos in rural Michoacán. Beneath the public spectacle, it explores queer desire, memory and belonging in a culture shaped by masculine tradition. Together, the three films give the weekend a striking range, from family and ageing to literature and hidden subcultures.

Plan your festival weekend

Saturday begins with The Celluloid Closet, a documentary tracing gay and lesbian representation in cinema, followed by a talkback with Q Cinema founder Todd Camp. The day continues with narrative shorts, a programme called 10s Across the Borders, and Clarissa in the evening.

Sunday brings more short documentaries, including Something in the Air, about transgender stormchaser Raychel Sanner, and Pride KelSo: No One Left Behind, followed by a discussion with Pride Kel-So leaders. The weekend’s advertised schedule also includes filmmaker conversations and community gatherings, so there’s more to do than settle into a seat and watch.

Festival passes are listed at $125, with individual tickets at $20. Check the official festival and ticketing pages for the latest programme and availability before making plans; event details can change, and a packed weekend is easier to enjoy when you’ve picked out the screenings you most want to see.

A return that’s about more than films

The festival’s return gives Fort Worth audiences a chance to reconnect with a long-running local platform for LGBTQ+ cinema, while welcoming a new generation of filmgoers. Its non-competitive format and mix of international, regional and emerging work put discovery at the centre of the weekend.

And that may be the best part: the films offer a starting point, while the conversations and shared experience make the festival feel like a gathering. For anyone curious about queer cinema in North Texas, Q Cinema’s 30th-anniversary return is a good moment to take a seat.

Explore the programme, choose a screening, and make a little room for conversation.

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