Film
IDFA Review: Long, Live, Love
When someone is suffering from a serious illness, focus naturally centres on their welfare and wellbeing. They become the centre of attention for their friends and family, whose trajectories shift to orbit around them. It’s easy to forget that those people dedicating their lives to caring for them can be equally traumatised, often suffering in …
IDFA Review: Jacinta
The bond between a mother and daughter is very special and entirely different to any other familial relationship. This closeness which comes both from nature and nurture is one which is extremely difficult to break. However, when things do go wrong it’s also a connection which can be severed forever. Motherly love is entirely unique …
IDFA Review: Ziyara
By the end of World War II, there had been a Jewish community in Morocco for over two thousand years. Their numbers peaked around 1948 when there were roughly 250,000 living in the North African country. With political turmoil, the prospect of independence and the creation of the State of Israel, the following years and …
IDFA Review: Gunda
As human beings we’re programmed to long for companionship. Now, that naturally comes from within our own species, but I’m sure no one really needs a biology lesson. However, unless you live in certain states of America, that is very different to the love and affection pets can give us. Whether that the sloppy and …
IDFA Review: The Last Hillbilly
In today’s popular culture the term ‘hillbilly’ is often used to describe someone who is unsophisticated, poor and from the country. Maybe even a little backwards. However, in reality the term originally simply referred to someone hailing from the (southern) Appalachian Mountains or the Ozarks. Perceptions of this group have evolved from the independent pioneering …
IDFA Review: Bulletproof
March 2020 marked a major landmark. It was the first month since 2002 when there had not been a school shooting in the US. And it only took a global pandemic to achieve this feat. The situation in America is astonishing to those of us looking in from the outside. The fact that these murders …
IDFA Review: Acasă, My Home
During the reign of Nicolae Ceaușescu in Romania he had a grand plan. This was to turn acres of swampy land on the outskirts of Bucharest into a reservoir. Whilst the end of communism prevented this venture coming to fruition it didn’t stop biodiversity flourishing. In 2014, after years of neglect which resulted in parts …
IDFA Review: The Grocer’s Son, the Mayor, the Village and the World…
One of the functions of documentary filmmaking is to allow an audience the opportunity to peek into someone else’s life. To afford the viewer an insight into a world they have little or no knowledge of or which is completely alien to them. Claire Simon has spent her career shining the light on the lives …
Film Review: Concrete Plans
Britain today, as a society, has come a long way in a relatively short time. Whilst the gap between the rich and the poor continues to grow, the class system is gradually eroding. However, whilst being born into the landed gentry will still afford you privilege, that doesn’t necessarily equate to having money; even if …
IDFA Review: The Earth is Blue as an Orange
In the aftermath of pro-European Union demonstrations which resulted in the Ukrainian Revolution of 2014 and the ousting of the government, there has been continued tensions on the eastern border. Fighting broke out with Russian-backed anti-government separatists in the Donbass (Donetsk and Luhansk regions). This conflict still rages today with the Kremlin looking to flex …