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  1. Culture
27 April 2012updated 14 Sep 2021 3:44pm

Gilbey on Film: Cinemagoers of the world unite!

The Bread and Roses film festival kicks off today.

By Ryan Gilbey

Cinemagoers of a revolutionary inclination rejoice! Cannes may already be creeping into media coverage a full fortnight before the festival begins, but Londoners can turn their attention instead to a different festival which kicks off today, its principles unlikely to be diluted by flashbulbs and red carpets. Not only that but it’s free (well, lots of it is, anyway). The Bread and Roses Film Festival marks the centenary of the 1912 textile workers strike. There will be screenings held across London, some even at the Clapham Common bandstand. (A tip: when you study the BBC’s five-day weather forecast, try not to think of the blue pearl dropping from the black cloud on each day as a splodge of rain, but rather a tear shed poignantly in recognition of the workers’ struggle. Also: pack a brolly.)

Here’s why it’s all going down:

The centenary of the 1912 strikes marks a window of opportunity to interrogate through film depictions and representations of capitalism, workers’ rights particularly female worker’s rights, strikes, social activism and immigration, debates and issues that are very much alive, if not the defining topics, of 2012. The festival was conceived to attract new and underrepresented audiences to film—groups, communities, and individuals that otherwise do not have access to seek out or afford access to such films… All community hosted screenings are free to attend allowing audiences normally economically marginalised from cinemas to be able to access films in their local community.

You can read more on the festival website. There’s an impressive menu of screenings and discussions. Eisenstein’s Strike will be shown with the accompaniment of a live score by The Cabinet of Living Cinema, whose repertoire includes Russian and Soviet folk and classical music rendered with a bewildering array of instruments which may or may not include a kitchen sink. A screening of Ken Loach’s Bread and Roses, about a Los Angeles cleaners’ uprising, will be followed by a Q&A with his producer, Rebecca O’Brien. Other influential figures speaking at the festival include Kim Longinotto and Nick Broomfield.  

Also in London next week, and unconnected with the Bread & Roses festival, is a free screening of Mathieu Kassovitz’s dynamic 1995 banlieue-set thriller La Haine, presented by the very wonderful Other Cinema, and accompanied by Asian Dub Foundation’s live score. The key detail here is that the screening takes place at the Broadwater Farm Estate community centre in Tottenham, North London. There will be further screenings of the movie in London and Paris, but Tottenham, where last summer’s riots began, is a particularly apposite venue for this film about the urban unrest following police brutality. Or is it too literal a venue? The Other Cinema has expressed a desire to screen movies such as Casablanca and Jules et Jim on the estate in the future—but should they have started there? La Haine is a good hook, and a fine film, but imagine screening something jazzy and colourful instead— Zazie Dans La Metro or Spirited Away or the mad Thai western Tears of the Black Tiger. What do you reckon?

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Or, if jazzy isn’t your bag, then some Ken Loach: wouldn’t he go down well? Kes is the way into cinema for a lot of young people; it was one of mine. Or, if you think Larky Loach would go down better, Looking For Eric would be a rousing choice. I haven’t seen his forthcoming film, The Angels’ Share, which opens in the UK in June, but I hear it has a comic bent. They could have premiered it at Broadwater Farm if it wasn’t already receiving its grand unveiling at, erm . . . Cannes.  

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