Festival Picks Top Black Filmmaking Talent

By Stuart Black Last edited 104 months ago
Festival Picks Top Black Filmmaking Talent

Afua's Diary

Today sees the start of the Black Filmmakers International Film Festival (or BFM) with three days of screenings and seminars that aim to "bring the unseen to light." The festival draws together work from around the world inside the Bernie Grant Arts Centre — named after Tottenham’s late legendary black MP.

The festival kicks off with the premiere of Looking For Love, a fly-on-the-wall comedy drama about relationships in the black community set against the backdrop of the Notting Hill Carnival (see the trailer below). There’ll be live music and a Q&A with director Menelik Shabazz, hailed as one of the godfathers of black British cinema.

Other highlights from London talent include Afua's Diary about a Ghanaian girl in the capital struggling with love and a rapidly expiring student visa; while As It Grows explores the issues of natural hair for women of African descent.

There are a host of short films worth a look: Bucky is directed by Danny John-Jules and shows a whole other side of the man best known for playing Cat from Red Dwarf; Burn meanwhile examines the riots of 2011 following the shooting of Mark Duggan.

From further afield, there's Black Out, a moving documentary about teenagers searching for education and systemic change in Guinea; then Faroeste Caboclo is a Brazilian Western, the title of which translates (rather handily) as Brazilian Western; and American Beatboxer, a US documentary that also does exactly what it says on the tin. a programme of scifi shorts also promises to be fresh and leftfield.

There are also workshops and seminars covering topics such as social media strategies, scriptwriting and making web dramas — with speakers behind the hugely successful web series Venus vs Mars and Brothers With No Game on hand.

BFM Festival runs 2-5 July at the Bernie Grant Arts Centre, Town Hall Approach Road, Tottenham Green, London, N15 4RX. For the full list of films and booking information visit the website.

Last Updated 02 July 2015