‘Queen Raquela’ and the amazing win at Berlin

“The Amazing Truth About Queen Raquela,” an Icelandic-Philippine co-production directed by Olaf De Fleur that was premiered in the Panorama main section of the Berlin Film Festival recently won in the prestigious Teddy Awards for Best Feature. It was awarded for “its ability to address race, gender, and poverty in an entertaining way while also playing with audiences expectations of form.”

The Teddy Awards have been presented at the Berlin Film Festival from the year 1980 and last February 15, it was the 22nd time they were given away. It has been a great honor for the Icelandic director Olaf de Fleur to have won the prize, since those who have won them in the past included Pedro Almodovar, Gus Van Sant and Lukas Moodyson.

The film tells the story of Raquela (starred by Raquela Rios), a poor transsexual—or “ladyboy” —who dreams of escaping the streets of Cebu City for a fairy tale life in Paris. Beverly Tanedo, the Cebuana production manager of the film, said that it was “shot here in Cebu, Bangkok, Reykjavik, Copenhagen, Paris and  started as a documentary. It’s a film based on real-life events and characters.” 

According to the director, the theme of the film is about wanting to be normal when you have no chance of it. He also said the film is not about being gay nor about sex change operations, but being human in surreal circumstances.

Olaf de Fleur was born 1975 in a small village in Iceland called Budardalur. He studied physics in Reykjavik, graduating in 1995. Since then he has participated in numerous film projects, including both feature and documentary films. After deciding to walk the film path, instead of going to film school, he founded the independent production company Poppoli Pictures. Headed by Johannesson as director and producer, the team created Blindsker that won the “Best Documentary” in the Icelandic Film Awards 2004 and Africa United that won the same prize in 2005.

Olaf de Fleur was nominated as the best Icelandic Filmmaker in 2005 and 2006 at the cultural DV (newspaper) awards and best director in 2005 at the Icelandic Film Awards. For more information on the film, visit http://www.queenraquelathemovie.com. On the director, check out his website at http://poppoli.com.