Projects in genres: Woman Director

Synopsis

A dazzling expression of the visual music revealed by 365 setting suns. Over 4500 time-lapse drawings were painted directly onto a continuous strip of 35mm film using a variety of materials such as nail varnish, hair, bleach, net stocking and magnolia petals. Arts Council England and Channel 4 Animate Award.

Synopsis

Triggered by an actual news item about suicidal octogenarian twins, The Stain is a dark, domestic thriller which uses drawn, puppet, pixilation and live-action animation styles to spin a claustrophobic web of incest and intrigue.

Synopsis

Mona Hatoum left Beirut in 1975 for a short visit to London. When war broke out in the Lebanon she found it impossible to return. In this video, letters from her mother in Beirut, written in Arabic, move across the screen. They are read aloud, in English, by the artist. Hatoum's mother is also heard, speaking openly about her feelings and sexuality, accompanied by images of her in the shower. Hatoum's video suggests exile and displacement. She has said it also challenges 'the stereotype of Arab women as passive, mother as non-sexual being'.

Synopsis

In their seminal, intersectional first feature, directors Maureen Blackwood and Isaac Julien incisively interrogate Black British experience, fusing dramatic scenes of family life with documentary and mystical elements, to give richly imaginative witness to a ‘post-colonial’ identity that encompasses generational, class, sexual and gender differences. Vividly manipulated footage of urban unrest, police brutality, gay rights marches and the miners’ strike, alongside chopped-up sequences showing a buzzing London night life, are intertwined, creating a penetrating example of Sankofa’s disruptive critique of 1980s Britain. And it looks fantastic. The film screens in a simultaneous transatlantic premiere with the New York Film Festival. (London Film Festival)

Synopsis

New York. Desperate for work, Christine takes a job selling tickets at the Variety, a sex cinema. This somewhat alienates her boyfriend Mark, who is investigating a story about union links with the Mob at the wholesale fish market. Christine finds herself drawn towards events on-screen, and also follows one of the customers, Louie, when he enters a sex shop, apparently on business. Louie, who is clearly both wealthy and powerful as a result of his shady activities, takes her to a ball game at Yankee Stadium. When he is suddenly called away, she again follows him and observes him at work. Variety inverts the traditional narrative structure of cinema – whereby a man watches and a woman is watched – without showing, and thus flaunting, the object of female desire. Creating a counter-narrative to Hollywood, Bette Gordon asks the same question formulated by Teresa de Lauretis in “Oedipus Interruptus”: “How did Medusa feel upon seeing herself in Perseus' mirror just before being slain?” Official Selection Berlinale 2019 - Forum Archival Constellations