Film Festival: Screening Rights

B-Film presents the inaugural Screening Rights Film Festival, a three-day programme of social justice film, and discussion, at mac birmingham.

The need for heartfelt films about the depths of human adversity around the world has grown enormously in recent decades. This new film festival will bring some of the best and most interesting of these films to Birmingham.

The festival programme combines screenings of highly acclaimed social justice films with post screening discussions involving directors, producers, writers, activists and experts.

Screening Rights Film Festival is a new venture led by Michele Aaron at the University of Birmingham. Screening Rights aims to inspire and develop debates on the potential of film to effect personal, social and political change.

PROGRAMME:

THURSDAY 09 JULY

LAUNCH EVENT/ SCREENING & DRINKS RECEPTION:
6PM | Open Bethlehem [dir: Leila Sansour, 2013, 90m]

Open Bethlehem is a story of a homecoming to the world’s most famous little town. Armed with her camera and her family’s unreliable car, Leila sets out to make an epic film about a legendary town in crisis but just a few months into filming the course of her life, and the film, takes an unexpected turn when her cousin Carol, Leila’s last relative in town, persuades her to stay and start a campaign to save the city.

Drawn from 700 hours of original footage and rare archive material, the film spans seven momentous years in the life of Bethlehem, revealing a city of astonishing beauty and political strife under occupation.

Following the screening, we are delighted to be joined by the film’s director, Leila Sansour (via Skype), and Salma Yaqoob, former leader and former vice-chairman of the Respect Party and a former Birmingham City Councillor. She is also the head of the Birmingham Stop the War Coalition and a spokesperson for Birmingham Central Mosque.

Admission £7.50/5.50* Book to reserve your place.
This film carries a PG Certificate but some scenes may be unsuitable for young children.

This event is sponsored by Voices of War and Peace: the Great War and its Legacy, funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC) in partnership with the Heritage Lottery Fund.

For the full festival listings please visit: http://screeningrights.org/film-festival/