Announcing our Refugee Week 2024 film programme at British Film Institute – a brilliant programme screening Talking with Rivers + intro and Q&A with directors Mohsen Makhmalbaf and Hana Makhmalbaf, hosted by Victor Fraga of Dirty Movies; Io Capitano + intro and discussion; Àma Gloria, Green Border and Bye Bye Tiberias. More details on each of the films being screened below:
Talking with Rivers + intro and discussion
+ intro and Q&A with directors Mohsen Makhmalbaf and Hana Makhmalbaf, hosted by Victor Fraga of Dirty Movies.
Sunday 23 June 2024 14:00 / NFT2
Two new films from the Makhmalbaf Film House explore the state of Afghanistan, its historical association with Iran and the terrible plight of its people as a result of colonial wars.
Director: Mohsen Makhmalbaf
With Mohsen Makhmalbaf, Jawanmard Paiez
UK-Iran 2023. 50min
English subtitles
A film essay featuring a poetic conversation between two neighbouring nations, Iran and Afghanistan, as they consider their shared and troubled history.
Screening with:
The List
Director: Hana Makhmalbaf
With Mohsen Makhmalbaf
UK-Afghanistan 2023. 65min
English subtitles
Film director Mohsen Makhmalbaf negotiates with international agencies and embassies for refugee relief in this unsettling portrait of artists attempting to flee Afghanistan following the sudden US and allied withdrawal in 2021.Content warning: Contains disturbing scenes.
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Io Capitano
Screening + intro and discussion 17 June 2024 17:50 / NFT3
Director: Matteo Garrone
With Seydou Sarr, Moustapha Fall, Khady Sy
Italy-Belgium-France 2023. 121min
Certificate 15
English subtitles
In this epic drama from the director of Gomorrah, two Senegalese teenagers attempt to travel across land and sea to Europe.
Senegalese youngsters Seydou and Moussa, keen to pursue a music career, leave Dakar for Europe. Their journey takes them across a vast expanse of desert, where they encounter vicious bandits and brutal authorities, then face the perils of a dangerous Mediterranean crossing. Garrone’s powerful drama was thoroughly researched, using first-hand accounts of the journey to map out the youngsters’ plight. The heart of the film is Seydou Sarr’s extraordinary performance, aided in no small part by breathtaking cinematography, moments of magical realism and a compassion that gives voice to the voiceless.Content warning: Contains scenes of torture.
In association with African Odysseys.
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Green Border
Screening 21 – 27 June
As part of Refugee Week 2024, Modern Films is happy to announce the screening of Green Border, from three-times Oscar-nominated Polish film director Agnieszka Holland, on Friday 21st June 2024, at the British Film Institute, NFT2, 5:50pm.
The film will be shown at the BFI from 21st June until the 27th June. Don’t miss it!
In the treacherous and swampy forests that make up the so-called “green border” between Belarus and Poland, refugees from the Middle East and Africa trying to reach the European Union are trapped in a geopolitical crisis cynically engineered by Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko. In an attempt to provoke Europe, refugees are lured to the border by propaganda promising easy passage to the EU.Pawns in this hidden war, the lives of Julia, a newly minted activist who has given up her comfortable life, Jan, a young border guard, and a Syrian family, intertwine. Through weaving together multiple perspectives, the film, shot starkly in black and white, explores the lives of these varied individuals, shedding light on the realities and challenges asylum seekers face.
Following its World Premiere at the 80th Venice International Film Festival, where it won the Special Jury Prize, GREEN BORDER, which uses multiple perspectives to look at the refugee crisis in Europe, opens our eyes, speaks to the heart, and challenges us to reflect on the moral choices that fall to ordinary people every day.
“Agnieszka Holland’s devastating refugee epic reverberates with deep empathy and quiet fury” ★★★★★ Time Out
“A vital bearing of cinematic witness to what is happening in Europe right now” ★★★★ The Guardian
“Insists that we not only look but see with clarity what is going on…essential, urgent and damning”- Eye for Film
BOOK TICKETS HERE
Àma Gloria
Screening 14 – 27 June
Director: Marie Amachoukeli
With Louise Mauroy-Panzani, Ilça Moreno
France 2023. 84min
Certificate: 12A
English subtitles
A BFI release
Six year old Cléo spends a final summer with her beloved nanny Gloria, in this profoundly moving story of chosen family, duty and innocence lost. Marie Amachoukeli’s solo-directorial debut grabs its audience tightly by the hand, transporting us back to a child’s world of innocence and turmoil. Six year old Cléo is devastated when the nanny she is devoted to returns to Cape Verde. Granted one last summer in the magical world she has built with Gloria, Cléo leaves her family in Paris to stay with her nanny and the children she has long been separated from. Newcomer Mauroy-Panzani’s portrayal of the envy, humour, delight and darkness contained within Cléo is dazzling, as she discovers there is a world which no longer revolves around her. Heartbreaking and heartwarming in equal measure, this coming-of-age tale uses imaginative animation and intimate camerawork to explore questions of class, culture and race with childlike wonder.Ruby McGuigan, Programme and Acquisitions
The screenings on Sunday 16 June 15:30 NFT4, Tuesday 18 June 18:30 NFT4 and Thursday 20 June 14:50 NFT4 will be presented with additional descriptive subtitles of non-dialogue audio.
BOOK TICKETS HERE
Bye Bye Tiberias
Screening 28 June – 4 July
Director: Lina Soualem
With Hiam Abbass
France-Palestine-Belgium-Qatar 2023. 82min
Certificate: TBC
English subtitles
A TAPE Collective release
A daughter’s powerful love letter to her mother and the strength of four generations of a Palestinian family.
Hiam Abbass, the star of Succession and films ranging from Lemon Tree to Blade Runner 2049, undertakes a journey back to her native Palestinian village in her daughter Lina Soualem’s tender and award-winning documentary. In her early twenties, Hiam Abbass left Palestine for Europe in order to follow her dreams of becoming an actor. She left behind her mother, grandmother and seven sisters. Some 30 years later, Soualem employs archival footage, photographs and poetry to excavate her family’s history and four generations of women who each had to make difficult decisions regarding their future. The result, as Hiam and Lina reconnect with their homeland, is a moving story of motherhood, fractured identity and lost homes, made with warmth and humour. It’s essential and deeply affecting for anyone who has ever wished to understand their mother better.
The screenings on Saturday 29 June 12:20 NFT3, Tuesday 2 July 18:20 NFT4 and Wednesday 3 July 12:30 NFT4 will be presented with additional descriptive subtitles of non-dialogue audio.
The screening of Bye Bye Tiberias on Friday 28 June 18:00 will be followed by a Q&A with co-writer Nadine Naous.
BOOK TICKETS HERE
