Projects in genres: Woman Director

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A short essay film by artist animator, Jessica Ashman. Using animation and recorded interviews of eight other women of colour artists, the film explores navigating the visual art and animation world as a black face in a white space.

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A documentary portrait of Braziers Park School of Integrative Social Research (Braziers), the longest-running secular resident community in the UK. Centred upon insights from current residents and members, the film interweaves scenes of daily life with the natural features, architectural characteristics and diverse cultural history of the community. Set in the wider context of sustainable living and the economics of post-capitalism, Intentional Community explores the 'sociobiological' ideas of Braziers' founders, who established the community in 1950 as a social experiment in group co-existence. Today, Braziers continues to explore and live-out ideas of co-existence, collective work and our place in nature. Edited with a layered, non-linear approach, the composite film makes correspondences between the past and present, combing interior and exterior spaces of the gothic manor house with material from Braziers’ archive of photographs, audio recordings and film. Archival footage includes scenes from a 1964 Situationist gathering, attended by writers Alexander Trocchi, Jeff Nuttall, artist John Latham and psychiatrist R.D. Laing. Intentional Community also explores Braziers’ links to the Common Wealth political party, the Order of Woodcraft Chivalry, Kibbo Kift, and Grith Fyrd peace camps, reflecting Braziers’ deep-rooted, progressive social values, educational ideas, ecological awareness and connections to the counterculture.

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A young art student goes on a journey to find her estranged alcoholic father. Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2017 - World premiere

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During a sleepover, four space obsessed 9-year-old girls embark on a secret mission in their cardboard rocket. When dad returns home, what will become of their mission?

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Qi’an, a Chinese student begins work as a film translator at a secluded English mansion. Working with her best friend, she discovers gruesome family secrets and uncovers the truth behind the tragic life of Kunqu opera star, Susu.

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Pili lives in rural Tanzania, working in the fields for less than $1 a day to feed her two children and struggling to manage her HIV-positive status in secret. When she is offered the chance to rent a sought-after market-stall, Pili is desperate to have it. But with only two days to get the deposit together, Pili is forced to make increasingly difficult decisions with ever-deepening consequences. How much will she risk to change her life? This film is a unique collaboration between the film-makers and women in the film. The story is based on their stories, the cast features only one trained actor, 70% of the cast are HIV+, and all locations such as the AIDS clinics are real.

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A Danish woman who is deaf and blind travels to Nepal to meet a woman with her same condition. A story about the beauty and complexity of communication, exploring the boundaries between how we interpret the world and how we perceive ourselves.

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13 year old Aamir has fled his home and been separated from his family only to be stranded alone in the largest unofficial refugee camp in Europe. When he is befriended by Katlyn, a well meaning but thinly stretched British volunteer, she becomes Aamir's last hope for salvation. Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2017 - Debate Strand

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Urges in the undergrowth, erupting fungal fantasies, bursting botanicals; the dust and desires of a tiny alternative universe. Imagining sensations of attraction and pleasure in insects, and the seduction methods of the plants and fungi that beckon.

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Dina lives in a remote village high in the Georgian mountains where traditions have remained the same for centuries. Her marriage has been arranged but when handsome Gegi returns from war, she falls in love with him and they elope. Four years later Dina is estranged from her family but lives happily with Geigi and their child. Then Gigi is tragically killed. In traditional Svaneti culture a widow must marry the first man who asks for her hand, so when Girshel proposes, Dina is forced to leave her home and little boy behind forever. However, when Moses falls deathly ill, Girshel fights through the treacherous winter snow to get the life saving medicine. In the end Dina’s, along with Girshel, defies years of tradition and takes her child with her back to Ushguli.

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“My humble model for progress is the reclamation of land. Which is repeatedly, never-ending retrieving what is lost.” (Graham Swift, Waterland) This film piece responds to the environment of the Fens, exploring an artificial landscape that exists only because of human intervention. Filmed over one day, it records bridges over a dike which carries water away from farmland to the river the Great Ouse. Official Selection Oberhausen Short Film Festival 2018 - International Competition

Synopsis

A group of young men try to interpret their friend's art, so they can save face and show support.