Events for Sunday, November 16, 2025

Shoga Films, an Oakland based media content creation non-profit, has been pioneering the concept of the Queer Harlem Renaissance since the release of its first film, a music video of a 1928 lesbian classic, back in 2006. After ten years of making documentaries, Shoga pivoted to filming narrative shorts. Two of these, "Congo Cabaret" and "Smoke, Lilies and Jade," were adapted from queer writings from the authors of the period. We are currently crowdfunding for a third short,"Bessie Shows Her Ass," about the legendary blues diva, Bessie Smith. The Shoga Films benefit program will consist of screening the two shorts (gorgeously shot and acted) mentioned above preceded by "The Queer Harlem Renaissance: A Prospectus," narrated by Daveed Diggs. For anybody interested in how African Amerians navigated the challenge of same-sex attraction during the Roaring Twenties, this is a dream line-up.

A charismatic criminal, while on the run from the police, hides in a hidden space of a toy store. There, he adopts a new identity and becomes involved with an employee, beginning a relationship as unlikely as it is risky.

Farah, an Iranian woman, migrates to her private planet to be free. She buys other people's memories in the form of Super 8 films and records and archives her own to create an alternative history of Iran.

Come and experience black love on the big screen this fall!
Devante and Liz run into each other at a house party on a starry night in San Francisco. There is an instant attraction. They ditch the party to explore San Francisco. As the night goes on, they begin to fall in love with each other and the city. 

This is a movie about black love in the bay area!!

Two conspiracy-obsessed young men kidnap the high-powered CEO of a major company, convinced that she is an alien intent on destroying planet Earth.