Esivi

Director: Shyla Lee

Year: 2021

A cinematic insight into the world of Michelle Mansell, a cold, open-water swimming coach. Through her work Michelle gives people an effective way of regaining mental and physical health and shifting their perspective on how the world around them can heal.

Director: Shyla Lee

Year: 2011

The Bedlamites are a group of fell runners who organise races up some of the most well-known and beautiful peaks in and around Yorkshire, UK. But these runners don't meet on a clear sunny day at the weekend or on a summer's evening. These races are run in winter, sometimes through thick fog and rain, on grassy, uneven and slippery terrain and during the night. Under the cover of darkness they meet to race up and down the Fells using only torches to guide them over the harsh terrain in severe weather conditions. Through this film we hope to transport the audience into this black and white world of nighttime, off-road running where moonlight and a chilly wind reveal the landscape in a very different way; where the snaking of lights up hillsides provide a luminous spectacle and where the narrow spread of the torchlight gives each runner a focus to drive them on up the hill.

Director: Siobhan Silén

Year: 2027

An animated VR short inspired by autistic musician Jen Msumba, who defies a system designed to erase her through synaesthetic music-making. It explores the universal need to be accepted for who we are. Participants journey through Jen’s life, from childhood, when the world feels confusing and “wonky”. Music is her safety and compass. While others read notes on a page, Jen sees visual maps that help her express emotions and navigate uncertainty. As a teenager, Jen’s mother becomes ill and her anxiety overwhelms her. Years of psychiatric institutions and medication leave her sedated, unable to play instruments. Her family sends her to the Judge Rotenberg Center, whose practices will later be described by the United Nations as torture. Over seven years of confinement and painful electric shocks, Jen is taught to believe she is “wrong”. Secretly composing music in her head becomes her refuge. Realising the centre will not support her independence, Jen writes to a judge and wins her freedom. She rediscovers music and invites us into her musical map, where participants touch and transform notes through movement, shifting melodies from classical to punk rock. We end with Jen performing on stage.