Marwan - Tomorrow's Freedom

Director: Sophia Scott, Georgia Scott

Year: 2016

Spending over a year in Lebanon on the borders of Syria, documentary directors Sophia Scott and Georgia Scott tell the story behind the news reports. The film is a reflection of the strange chaotic lives of the people living in the shadow of the Syrian war, giving an intimate look at how four Syrians, whose collective struggles constitute the new frontline of the refugee crisis, are trying to find ways to overcome the torment of their shattered lives. Interwoven through the film are the contributions of a German professor who works with the local Syrian and Lebanese communities in the north trying to build a new model for peace through interfaith dialogue and access to education for the displaced Syrian children. These are the Syrian people who we see in the news drowning in the Mediterranean. These five protagonists are the people who will bring forward the global debate on the conflicts at hand from a human, rather than figures-based point of view.

Director: Theo Rollason

Year: 2026

Spring 1991: queer life is under renewed attack in Britain, and filmmaker Derek Jarman is adapting Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II into a radical protest film. Drawing on extraordinary never-before-seen footage shot by Seamus McGarvey on Jarman’s set, QUEER EDWARD 11 is about the refusal to separate art from life, politics from pleasure. Official Selection Venice Film Festival 2026 Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2026

Director: Wallace Minchong Li

Year: 2026

European archival footage from the 1950s documents the life of indigenous, nomadic Sahrawi children and youth in Western Sahara / Morocco. Seventy years later, local young people from Laayoune (El Aaiún) revisit locations that may have appeared in the footage. From ocean to desert to oasis, under trembling starlight, they share their thoughts on life, dreams, and utopia as they search for an uncertain upstream. Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2026