The 27^th Connecticut LGBT Film Festival concluded a successful nine-day run on June 7, with dual screenings in downtown Hartford at Spotlight Cinemas and the Wadsworth Atheneum that included special appearances by film writer/directors and actors. Hartford Mayor Pedro Segarra delivered welcoming remarks prior to the international premiere of Queen of Amsterdam. The other closing night film, Tru Love, took the top spot as the Audience Award winner for Best Feature Film. Audience awards are based on the ballots that the audience completes after each screening.

“Our audience has never failed to recognize the power of dramatic arts and the poetic vision captured in these films," said Co-Director Laura Williams. "The exceptionally high audience ratings of this year's films really cements for the Festival Committee how important our job is to deliver up cinematic art and the star power behind it."

Here is the lineup of award-winning films:

Best Feature - Audience Award
Winner – Tru Love
Runner Up – The Way He Looks (Hoje Eu Quero Voltar Sozinho)
Special Mention – Boy Meets Girl

Best Documentary - Audience Award
Winner – To Be Takei
Runner Up – Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia
Special Mention – A Self Made Man

Best Short - Jury Award
Winner – A Last Farewell
Runner Up – She Said, She Said

Special Mention – Summer Vacation

Directors Award
Eric Schaeffer (Boy Meets Girl)

Tru Love transcends age, orientation and gender with dramatic brilliance, as a poetic tale weaving a complex triangulation between three women, whose simple truths are revealed, and depths of their relationships tested as each seeks love and companionship from the other. A Brazilian film, The Way He Looks (Hoje Eu Quero Voltar Sozinho) is a feature-length version of last year's crowd-pleasing, award-winning short film I Don't Want To Go Back Alone. Directed by Daniel Ribeiro, it’s a sweet story about a blind high school student who falls in love with the new boy in his class. Set in a quiet Kentucky community that is starting to embrace change, Boy Meets Girl is a tender coming of age story that follows the lives of two friends and explores the bisexual orientation of a transgender woman as her friendships blossom into love affairs.

In the Best Documentary category, the Audience Award went to To Be Takei. At times funny but often serious, it focuses on Star Trek star George Takei’s life as a survivor of the Japanese-American internment camps, his struggle with Hollywood stereotyping of Asian actors, and his newfound fame as a Facebook sensation, with comic relief provided by his husband Brad. Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia is a retrospective documentary of the legendary and sometimes scandalous author Gore Vidal. A Self Made Man paints an intimate portrait of one of Connecticut's most well known transgender youth advocates, Tony Ferraiolo.

The Jury Award for Best Short Film went to the film A Last Farewell, which tells the story of an aging father who finds it difficult to reconcile with his daughter who assisted in the suicide of his partner after a long and difficult illness. The audience was uplifted by the high fashion and dramatic interludes of She Said, She Said, starring Melissa Tomei and Elodie Bouchez, who showed that breaking up can be fun to do.  In Summer Vacation, an Israeli family’s vacation is interrupted by the sudden return of a former lover whose affections are slowly rediscovered.

This year’s Directors Award went to Eric Schaeffer, the creative force behind Boy Meets Girl. "The Directors Award is intended to recognize a director whose vision brought something new and special to the film festival, and Eric Schaeffer's film, as well as his Q&A via Skype, created a sensation that had audience members abuzz throughout the entire festival,” said Co-Director Shane Engstrom.

Out Film CT, which organizes the festival, is a nonprofit cultural organization dedicated to presenting outstanding LGBT cinema and other theatrical events throughout the year, culminating in the nine-day Connecticut LGBT Film Festival. Connecticut's longest-running film festival holds a special place in our state’s cultural landscape, bringing the community together to introduce, celebrate and rediscover the ideas and values that make the LGBT community unique. Out Film CT also presents the EROS Film Festival each fall and the First Thursdays Cinema series, with screenings at Cinestudio on the first Thursday of the month. The series will resume July 3 at 7:30 p.m. with the comic film Birthday Cake. www.outfilmct.org