Two powerful short films about Asylum!

bristol | miscellaneous | event notice Thursday June 14, 2012 16:19 by Rushlight

Sue Clayton introduces her film Hamedullah: The Road Home – following the fate of an 18 year-old deported to Afghanistan – Best Short Documentary at this year’s London International Film Festival.  Followed by 1000 Voices – an animation by Ctrl.Alt.Shift contrasting official rhetoric with the horrific realities that have forced detainees to flee to the UK.  

Every year about 2000 lone children come to the UK, escaping war-zones like Afghanistan and Iraq.  They settle into British life, do well at school, make friends – but, as soon as they turn 18, they’re arrested in terrifying dawn raids and flown out on secret ‘ghost flights’ to be dumped, penniless and unprepared, back in the war zones they fled from.  Sue Clayton covertly filmed young Afghan Hamedullah as he was led away barefoot in the rain, handcuffed to Border Agency guards.  She had given him a tiny video camera – and, for the first time, we are able to see a reality unfold that the Home Office would much rather we didn’t. 
“A bold, original documentary” (Amnesty International) – “a very important film” (Emma Thompson). 

Voice-messages from imprisoned asylum seekers haunt an abandoned Ministry basement while upstairs a pompous official lectures teenagers about the UK’s asylum system. 
“1000 Voices” by Tim Travers Hawkins and Ctrl.Alt.Shift was awarded a Silver Dragon for Best Short Animation at the 2010 Krakow International Film Festival, and won the Best Short Documentary Award at the 24th Dallas Video Festival (2011).  “Executed beautifully… a tremendously affecting animated documentary… both amazingly thought-provoking and stylishly done” (Little White Lies magazine).

Two screenings: 7pm & 9pm at The Cube Cinema, 4 Princess Row, Bristol BS2 8NQ, 0117 907 4190.  Tickets: £5 (£4 concs) - free to refugees & asylum seekers.  Part of national Refugee Week.