Beyond the Rush
(NIYADRE, UK) 16m
How do communities reclaim their space, their voice, and their future?
A poignant and poetic exploration of the rise and decline of Luton’s once vibrant Caribbean culture. Through intimate personal stories, rich historical context, and a cultural lens, the film traces how a thriving legacy rooted in migration, music, resistance, and community has been gradually eroded over the years.
From the golden days of sound system culture and bustling youth clubs to the bouncing spirit of Luton Carnival formerly Europe’s largest one day Caribbean carnival, the film reflects on how these vital cultural institutions have been systematically dismantled through decades of underfunding, neglect, and shifting priorities. These weren’t just events or social spaces, they were expressions of identity and anchors of community.
this 16 minute documentary offers a poetic and thought provoking insight and invites audiences from all backgrounds to engage in deeper reflection on the value of heritage and the fragility of community spaces.
Do You See What I See?
(Ashley Morris, UK) 10m
In 2024 shoplifting is on the rise. The cost of living crisis continues to push people further into deep poverty. DO YOU SEE WHAT I SEE? interweaves women’s stories of hardship against the backdrop of a society in decline. Gaining an understanding of why they are resorting to breaking the law in order to survive.
In a Britain gripped by the cost-of-living crisis, shoplifting is on the rise. This poignant short film weaves together the stories of women pushed to the edge by poverty, offering a stark yet empathetic look at the desperation driving them to break the law to survive. Through their experiences, we gain a deeper understanding of the societal forces at play in a country on the brink.
Caution Spawn Ahead
(Stacey Larkins, USA) 15m
An experimental film, mostly told in rhyme, that explores our current political climate (in the U.S.), presented as a warning in a banned children’s book.
Stacey Larkins is an award winning filmmaker, writer and musician residing in the New York city metropolitan area. She has shot written, directed, composed and edited several short films that have played in numerous festivals across the country. Her films have also been featured on Kweli TV, Shorts TV as well as Aspire TV’s Urban Indie Film Block.
She has also written work for theater, that has been produced by theatrical production companies in New York City and in the U.K.
Memoria Divisa/Divided Memory
(Vittoria Benigno, UK) 4m
Memoria Divisa is a hybrid documentary film and academic research project that explores the role of citizen journalism during the 2001 Genoa G8 Summit. Combining archival footage, impressionistic storytelling, and contemporary visuals, the film challenges dominant narratives constructed by mainstream media and state institutions.
Through a multidisciplinary lens—drawing on media theory, memory studies, and visual culture—the project interrogates the ethics of representation, the power of grassroots journalism, and the contested legacy of the Genoa G8.
Visually fragmented and emotionally evocative, Memoria Divisa blends experimental aesthetics with documentary realism to question how truth is constructed, remembered, and mediated. The work invites viewers to reflect on the fragility of memory, the politics of visibility, and the enduring relevance of citizen journalism in today’s media landscape.
Ya Hanouni
(Lyna Tadount, Sofian Chouaib, France) 3m
While the Mom and the Dad try to put their baby to sleep, a competition arises between them: who will manage to get the baby to say the first word?
Ya Hanouni was born from the need to reflect the fragility of everyday life for families living under bombardment in Palestine. We were deeply shaken by the images and testimonies coming from Gaza, by the way violence disrupts the most intimate moments. Through this shortfilm, we wanted to echo that silent collapse, where love and fear coexist in the same space, and where the ordinary becomes unbearable.
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Instagram link to the shortfilm: https://www.instagram.com/yahanouni/
Why We Pride
(Natalie Scarsbrook, UK) 8m
This documentary chronicles the rise and fall of LGBT rights in the UK and shows why marches and pride events must continue as there is still a way to go for equality.
Lång resa/Long Journey
(Anders Österberg, Sweden) 15m
Twenty boys born in Afghanistan came to Brottby in Sweden in 2015 during the so called refugee wave. A few people from the local parish got to know them.
The film depicts what has happened to some of the Afghan youths who came to Stångberga (then a care and HVB home) in Brottby, Sweden in 2015. Two-thirds of it is filmed in Össeby-Garn in Brottby.
In 2024, I followed Ramin, one of the boys, during his work in the home care industry. In Brottby, he and two other boys meet again and I have a conversation with them talking about themselves and about how things have turned out for them; about life in Sweden and about cultural differences.
Josefin Vannerus, who was then the communications and integration coordinator in the parish, also appears in the film.
Sixty-seven Milliseconds
(Fleuryfontaine, France) 15m
In search of a bullet whose trail has been captured on surveillance camera footage, the film follows its trajectory and those of its main protagonists. Blending the early cinema technique of chronophotography with CGI, Sixty-seven Milliseconds questions the legitimacy of policing in France and warns of its excesses.
In search of a bullet whose trail has been captured on surveillance camera footage, the film follows its trajectory and those of its main protagonists. At the heart of a reconstruction that combines the practice of computer-generated images with the history of the moving image, Sixtyseven Milliseconds questions the legitimacy of policing in France and warns of its excesses.
The Sight Is a Wound
(Parham Ghalamdar, Iran) 7m
"The Sight is a Wound" is a haunting meditation on the collapse of imagery in the face of modern atrocities. The film begins with a simple question: What can the artist offer when the images of our time overwhelm the capacity of frames to contain them? In the wake of the ongoing genocide in Gaza—live-streamed by its perpetrators and rendered unbearable in its clarity—Ghalamdar burns over 50 of his own paintings, works exhibited in solo and group shows across renowned institutions worldwide.
The act of destruction becomes a visceral response to the impossibility of creating images with greater urgency or ethical weight than those emerging from Gaza’s harrowing reality. Flames consuming canvases dominate the screen, transforming the medium of painting into ash and silence.
The film is neither a documentary nor a protest piece but a striking video-poem exploring the moral and philosophical collapse of image-making itself. It presents a stark challenge to artists and audiences alike, urging a reckoning with complicity, desensitization, and the ethical failure of seeing in the age of digital oversaturation. "The Sight is a Wound" is not just a film; it is a funeral for the image and an invocation of silence.
Instagram @parham.ghalamdar | Website www.ghalamdar.com
Memories I Keep Unearthing
(Katia Hiver, UK) 3m
The 1930s were a time of upheaval and transformation, where opposing forces collided and new voices emerged. In East London, the small yet determined Film and Photo League defied traditional distribution systems to independently capture these voices with striking precision and unyielding spirit. Though long forgotten, fragments of their work have been rediscovered and reexamined through the dedicated efforts of the 'four corners' photographers’ gallery and Sam Stevens.
“Memories I Keep Unearthing” repurposes this footage blending it with additional Super8, video, film, and digital photography to create a layered, visual dialogue between past and present. Part of a Four Corners initiative to preserve East London’s history and foster artistic expression (supported by the University of Westminster and Arts Council England), the film reimagines forgotten voices with renewed relevance.
Through a lyrical and contemplative lens, “Memories I Keep Unearthing” explores themes of change and resistance. The Earth itself becomes the narrator, in both slumber and immense power, recalling the echoes of shouts and the reverberation of stomping feet, echoes of an older time into the modern world.
Instagram: @hiver.katia.
Venüs'e Açılan Pencere/The Window to Venus
(Zeliha Karakoca, Turkey) 20m
"Because I was a girl..."
"For a mother to have boundaries means that her children will have boundaries too..."
"...we are all part of the ecosystem. And we all need each other."
"I am not in favor of patriarchal or matriarchal dominance; I prefer equality and solidarity."
"I wanted to feel that I wasn't alone, and it made me feel that way."
Who draws the boundaries of our unlimited potential?
Can women in a patriarchal society transcend the fears and limitations created in their minds through social, cultural, environmental, and individual means? Could the patriarchal structure also be limiting the freedoms of men?
The documentary invites women to look freely through the Window to Venus and to think, speak about gender equality.
Vari Tsifteteli
(Britte van Meurs, Netherlands) 5m
Two Belgians sing in Greek as they stand on the windswept dunes of the North sea coast. The rhythm is a 'tsifteteli', which is traditionally joyful music, but this original composition by Noma takes on the tone of Belgian clouds, as it talks of refugee boats washed up on European shores.
On the same wintery coast, a delicate puppet in a paper boat floats towards a fortress made of sand. But the waves are wild, and the hands that pull the strings, have a plan of their own.
In this music video, Belgian duo Noma perform a song in which they mourn the refugee boats washed up on Greek beaches. They wonder what became of the people, and where the children went to. The video traces the journey of a small puppet in a paper boat. It is set for a fortress made of sand. But the waves are high, and the hands holding the strings have a plan of their own