Projects in categories: Documentary

Synopsis

The pace of technological progress in the physical world has stalled. WE MADE TELEPHONES converts mid-20th century propaganda and advertising into a personal, intergenerational exploration of how the ‘world of atoms’ fell apart—and how it might yet recover.

Synopsis

Bodies of water are intervened upon, moved, disrupted and exploited. Labouring bodies experience similar pressures from the same forces of power and extraction. Distant communities – Northern England and Jamaica – share similar histories of manipulation and oppression whose record is kept in the living memory of its waterways. But water, like people, can find a way to exert its own will. Official Selection International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) 2025 - World premiere

Synopsis

In the heart of Nepal, nestled amid majestic landscapes and ancient traditions, lies a profound tapestry of spiritual and religious practices. Nepal's history has been predominantly shaped by patriarchal traditions: the Sramana tradition of renunciates and the Brahmana tradition of priests. Yet, there exists a lesser-known matriarchal tradition. Kathmandu, Nepal's capital, meticulously planned by its founder Gunakamdev, features a unique constellation of eight Ajima temples on its peripheries. These temples, dedicated to the grandmother goddesses Ajima, serve as protectors of the city and hint at matriarchal ideals. Tantra, a spiritual path focusing on energy and liberation, adds another layer to Nepal's spiritual landscape. Unlike patriarchal traditions, Tantra celebrates women's sexuality, emphasizing mutual enjoyment and viewing the body as a sacred temple. Within this matriarchal framework, six genders are recognized, promoting a more inclusive understanding of human diversity. Kathmandu's labyrinth of temples, structures, and symbols offers glimpses into a bygone era when wise women possibly ruled and protected society, and when Tantra and other spiritual practices flourished. However, invading patriarchal forces have rewritten Nepal's history, obscuring its rich and diverse spiritual heritage, leaving many unaware of their profound legacy.

Synopsis

Plunging us into the ever-accelerating rhythm of food supply and the emergence of new techno-capitalist processes, BLISS POINT looks at the entanglement of automation and human labour, from dark kitchens and food advertising sets to AI-managed warehouses. Official Selection Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 2024

Synopsis

Friends, colleagues and strangers compare notes on their journeys with hormonal birth control - and its indelible effects on their mental health.

Synopsis

During the Blitz of World War Two, 10-year-old Harry Hawkesworth roller skates through Gloucestershire delivering messages for the Air Raid Patrol, while Italian prisoners of war work the local fields. MARMALADE tells the story of Harry Hawkesworth’s experience during the Second World War, as a 10-year-old messenger boy for his local Air Raid Patrol. Now 95 years old, Harry is interviewed by his grandson, photographer Jamie Hawkesworth, for his debut film. He mentions biscuits, marmalade, and recollects the Italian prisoners of war he met who worked the land in his hometown of Tuffly, Gloucestershire. The film gracefully weaves the past and present together through Jarvis Cocker’s mesmerising score.

Synopsis

A work of speculative cinematic writing, the film is about war and displacement, architecture and place-making. It tells the fragmented biography of the so-called Rock Church, an iconic building in Helsinki and its architects who were excluded from the canon of Finnish modernism. The architects' personal history of displacement due to the Finnish Winter War of 1939 and Soviet occupation is braided with the war on present-day Gaza. Past and present histories, temporalities and geographies fold into, and over one another collapsing time, place and identities narratively to consider, in the gentlest of tones, the impact of atrocities on contemporary lifeworlds.

Synopsis

Divided by barriers and borders, the three sisters confront their childhood after spending decades apart in culturally and politically diverging countries. For all of them, one moment in life determined everything that followed. An emotionally revealing essay film.

Synopsis

A creative biography of the Scottish artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham. One of the most important women in British modern art, the painter Wilhelmina Barns-Graham was a highly inspirational figure, whose work was deeply impacted by a pivotal event in her life. In May 1949, this leading representative of the modernist St. Ives group of artists climbed to the top of the Grindelwald glacier in Switzerland, an experience which was to transform the way she saw the world. She spent the rest of her life capturing its shapes and colours, indeed its very essence. In his essayistic portrait Cousins delves into complex themes of gender, climate change and creativity, while laying bare the artist’s character and vast imagination so pervasively that he creates the impression we are seeing the world through her eyes. Official Selection Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 2024 - World premiere Official Selection Edinburgh International Film Festival 2024

Synopsis

On 18 June 1984, at the height of the 1984-85 Miners’ Strike, Orgreave Coking Plant in South Yorkshire became the site of the bloodiest day of the longest and most violent industrial dispute in British history. The media subsequently appeared to lay blame for the violence at the feet of the strikers. Daniel Gordon’s comprehensive documentary doesn’t just overturn this fabrication, it portrays what took place as planned action on the part of the Thatcher government, with the Prime Minister determined to seek redress for the National Miners’ Union’s victory over the Conservative government in the early 1970s and to forever break the union’s role at the heart of British working class society. Released on the 40th anniversary of the battle, and featuring first-hand accounts and archive footage, this is a searing portrait of that tragic event. (Sheffield DocFest Programme) Official Selection Sheffield DocFest 2024 - World premiere

Synopsis

Filmed over the course of five years, this award-winning film follows Borja, a young boy growing up in Castellon, a small town in Spain, where the tradition of bullfighting weighs heavily on his shoulders. His grandad, Matias, pins his own unfulfilled dreams of becoming a professional bullfighter onto his grandchild with the hopes that it will get the family out of poverty. Like most underprivileged kids feeling trapped in a life with few choices and opportunities, Borja doesn’t see a future beyond orange fields, fishing and bullfighting. Official Selection Sheffield DocFest 2024 International First Feature Competition - World premiere Sheffield DocFest 2024 - Winner - Grand Jury Award for the International First Feature Competition

Synopsis

A new feature-length documentary depicting the extraordinary and emotional return of blur, captured across a year in which the band made a surprise return with their first record in 8 years, the critically acclaimed #1 album ‘The Ballad of Darren’. The film follows the unique relationship of four friends and band mates of over three decades - Damon Albarn, Graham Coxon, Alex James and Dave Rowntree - as they come together to record 10 new songs ahead of their sold-out, first ever shows at London’s Wembley Stadium in 2023. Official selection Sheffield DocFest 2024 - World premiere