Inspired by true events, the story of the first American women who tested for space travel. Their psychological and physical endurance broke records. They were pioneers and adventurers who battled the inequalities of their time, whose exploits remained a state secret for some time.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Journey Strand - World premiere
When Ella was twelve, she had her first fight. And when she was twelve, she discovered sex. Now eighteen, Ella reflects on how her obsession with her older brother Michael's best friend Moses left her with a secret she still carries.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - World premiere
Transcending the sound and visual of the drum, using nature’s most destructive forces fire and water as catalysts for destruction and creating a mood piece of raw, ritualistic, drumming phenomena.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Cult Strand
Taking its title from the French Surrealist artist, Claude Cahun’s (1894-1954) incomplete memoir 'Confidences au miroir', Sarah Pucill's film brings life to the photographic and written archive of Claude Cahun amidst a visual extravaganza of costumes and hand-made sets.
Following Cahun’s text, the film includes Cahun’s early and later life and work, including her political propaganda activity and imprisonment in Jersey with her partner Suzanne Malherbe during the Nazi occupation of the island. The tracing of a life is made conscious through the projection of images of the couples' home in Jersey into a domestic London setting.
As a sequel to director Sarah Pucill's previous film 'Magic Mirror' (2013), this film continues her experiment to bring cinematic life to the photographic and written archive of Claude Cahun. In this film Pucill animates re-stagings of Cahun’s black and white self-portrait and still–life photographs with voices from Cahun's text 'Confidences au miroir', collaging and transposing black and white stills and words, into colour and soundscape.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Experimenta Strand - World premiere
An intimate and vivid account of a young girl’s real and fantastical adventure in a remote forest one evening.
Glasgow-based artist-filmmaker Margaret Salmon's debut feature is not only a loving homage to classic children’s films such as Ray Ashley’s 'Little Fugitive', Jean Renoir’s 'The River' and Albert Lamorisse’s 'The Red Balloon', but draws from nature studies of the past, such as Mary Field’s 'Secrets of Nature' series.
Shot on 35mm in various locations around Scotland, Salmon draws inspiration from a range of cinematic movements as well as wildlife documentaries to produce a lyrical and sensual portrait of a child’s eye perspective on the natural world. (LFF brochure)
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Experimenta Strand - World premiere
Gertrude Bell was a pioneering English writer, archaeologist, diplomat and spy whose travels through the Arabian desert gave her local knowledge unparalleled by her British peers. Recruited by British Military Intelligence after World War I, she played a significant – often unrecognised – role in British imperial policy-making in the Middle East, notably Iraq. Openly critical of colonial practices, Bell’s insights are a singular, prescient prism through which to understand both the Middle East and the all-male inner sanctum of British colonial power. Directors Oelbaum and Krayenbühl weave together a rich tapestry of fascinating archive alongside Bell’s writings, letters to her parents, and testimony from peers including TE Lawrence and Vita Sackville-West. Though writing a century ago, the acute contemporary relevance of Bell’s words is astonishing – at times even chilling. (LFF brochure)
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Journey Strand
Using double screen, the filmmaker juxtaposes her domestic family history with that of Nelson Mandela prior to his arrest. The artist considers the roles that personal and political histories play in opening up the narratives of a place.
Liliesleaf Farm, located in Rivonia South Africa, was the headquarters of the military wing of the African National Congress, (‘Umkhonto we Sizwe') in the early 1960s. Nelson Mandela lived at Liliesleaf under an alias. ‘Operation Mayibuye’ was an ANC undercover campaign of sabotage intended to bring down the apartheid government.
Ideas for the film originated with 8mm film footage and photographs of
Gaal-Holmes’ immigrant family at Liliesleaf. Her German and Hungarian parents had recently moved to settle in South Africa, and Liliesleaf became their family home for a short time in the late 1960s.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Experimenta Strand - World premiere
New Year’s Eve in a Lesbos port. A filmmaker meets Noor, a young Syrian woman. They make a short film together with a phone.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Debate Strand - World premiere
A recreation and contemplation inspired by the 31-mile walk of refugee Abdul Rahman Haroun through the Channel Tunnel. On arrival to the UK Haroun was arrested under an arcane Victorian railway law.
The language in this bylaw, when juxtaposed against the physical and emotional feat of traversing 30 miles of the Channel Tunnel supplies the terrain for this film.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Experimenta Strand
A mysterious woman travels through the threatening territory of film noir and the enigmas of philosophy.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - Experimenta Strand
A classic interview with Helen Mirren from 1975 is performed as a song by Kathryn Elkin, backed by a choir of associates and friends whom she corrals into chanting in loose harmony.
Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2016 - World premiere
