Lift

Director: Marc Isaacs

Year: 2020

When the Filmmaker is told his next film must be about crime, sex or celebrity to get funded, he takes matters into his own hands and begins shooting in his home with a cast of characters connected to his own life. We first meet two English builders, employed to replace the garden fence, temporarily removing the barrier between the house and a Pakistani neighbour. This introduces the film’s central theme of hospitality which ultimately finds its expression when a homeless Slovakian man charms the Filmmaker’s Colombian cleaner to let him in and tests everyone's ideas of the expectations and boundaries between host and guests. Official Selection Sheffield Doc/Fest 2020 - World Premiere

Director: Marc Isaacs

Year: 2006

Funny and bizarre, this is the heart-warming tale of an unlikely family striving to achieve spiritual fulfilment in the murky waters of the 21st century.   In a quiet corner of England a former rabbi is living a remarkable life based on the ancient patriarchy of the Old Testament. Six years ago, God told the rabbi that he was to become a Hebrew King, and like a good patriarch, take multiple wives. Now he raises horses, runs four second-hand furniture shops in Brighton and Hove and lives with seven women who, while not legally his spouses, believe their union is sanctioned by God. Each seeks a different sort of spiritual fulfilment: from Chava, widowed after 25 years of marriage and the oldest of the wives, to Tracy, who has been banished from the house for resisting Philip’s patriarchal role. As the film progresses, the filmmaker gets extraordinary close to the family but reserves judgement, preferring to present them with all their foibles, strengths and contradictions.

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.