Film / News
Fifth Bristol Radical Film Festival announced
The Labour Party elects as its leader a left-wing working class firebrand from Sheffield who goes on to become Prime Minister. Emboldened by his huge mandate, he sets about enacting all the policies he campaigned on, from unilateral nuclear disarmament to true open government and removing US military bases from UK soil. Needless to say, the establishment gangs up to depose him.
Despite the best efforts of Tony Benn (remember him?), this all seemed rather unlikely back in 1982, when Labour back-bencher Chris Mullin wrote the political thriller A Very British Coup, and indeed when Alan Plater adapted it for Bristol University graduate Mick Jackson’s 1991-set C4 TV drama in 1988. Today, it seems all too relevant given recent events in the Labour Party.
is needed now More than ever
This BAFTA and Emmy winning film is much discussed but rarely seen on screen today. So it seems rather appropriate that it should open the fifth annual Bristol Radical Film Festival on Friday, October 7, after last year’s fest benefited from the wave of optimistic Corbynmania.
“A Very British Coup is the perfect opening film, because it corresponds to one of the biggest, and ongoing, news stories this year – the Labour coup,” agrees filmmaker Elizabeth Mizon, one of the volunteers behind BRFF.
“But hopefully this will be an entry point, one of many, for people to appreciate the rest of our programme too. The festival is populated with an amazing array of work. I’m personally more excited about this year’s programme than any previous one – particularly Black Is…Black Ain’t by one of my favourite filmmakers, Marlon Riggs. I imagine very few people will have seen his work before, which is ridiculous. It’s brilliant, hilarious, anger-inducing and fun.”
You can see Black Is…Black Ain’t on Saturday, October 8. This is the final film by US filmmaker, poet and gay right activist Riggs. Blending performance and poetry with commentary from the likes of Angela Davis, it amounts to a powerful critique of sexism, patriarchy, homophobia and cultural nationalism in America.
Also showing is William Greaves’ ground-breaking Symbiopsychotaxiplasm, which has been described by the New Yorker as “one of the greatest films about film-making ever made”. The screening will be followed by a discussion led by the Bristol Expanded and Experimental Film (BEEF) collective.
Next up is Sleaford Mods: Invisible Britain – rather grandly described as “part band doc, part look at the state of the nation”, in which the punky Nottingham duo known as the Sleaford Mods (Jason Williamson, Andrew Fearn) visit those neglected parts of austerity Britain that make them so angry and sweary. This one will be followed by a director Q&A. Finally, the day concludes with a radical knees-up.
Sunday, October 9, kicks off with a selection of ten of the best shorts from the 2,000+ submissions to BRFF’s annual competition. Some of the filmmakers will be present for a Q&A afterwards.
Then the BRFF team host an open discussion. “We always have a discussion, panel or Q&A after each screening, but this year we have our first dedicated talk, which is a chance for our audiences to learn about how we get the festival to happen without funding, what our aims and plans are, and also a chance for us to ask the audiences questions,” explains Elizabeth.
“What do they want to see us do next? What would they do if they ran the festival? How can we get more people engaged in film cultures, and in activist work?”
The festival climaxes with another chance to see Bristolian director Esther May Campbell’s acclaimed feature debut, Light Years.
Described as a “poetic and startling story of loss, hope and the deepest of human connections”, this features the acting debut of singer/songwriter Beth Orton and premiered at last year’s Venice Film Festival. For more on the film, see our news story here.
BRFF 2016 runs over three days from October 7-9 at The Old Malt House in St. Pauls. Admission to individual events is £6/£4 (concessions) on the door. You can also get a full festival pass for £30. Advance tickets for all events are available here.
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