Our regular monthly update featuring the latest news and opportunities for your cinema, festival or film society.
ICO News
- Thank you to everyone who joined us at Autumn Screening Days this month, whether in person in Leicester or online. Keep an eye on your inbox, as we’ll be opening registration for Spring Screening Days very soon. That event will run in person at BFI Southbank, London on 9 & 10 March, with films screening online from 11-17 March.
- Last week we headed to Tallinn, Estonia to attend the Industry Event at the Black Nights Film Festival. There, we met with representatives of festivals from across Europe to hear about their experiences and discuss the current challenges and opportunities for film festivals – including our newly launched International Film Festival Network (IFFN).
- We’re pleased to confirm that we will continue to represent Fronza Woods’ films in the UK. Her two beautiful shorts (Killing Time and Fannie’s Film) are wonderful portraits of the inner lives, dreams and desires of two very different New York women, and we hope they continue to become better known. Visit our website to view our full catalogue of films available for booking.
- Looking for a space to work from? We currently have several desks available to rent in our office, located just a few minutes walk from London Bridge station. Take a look at the details and get in touch if you’d like to arrange a viewing.
- We’re looking to commission new writing for our blog. If you have an idea for an article about a current issue in film exhibition or a case study of good practice, then we’d love to hear from you! Read our guidelines to see some topics we’re interested in and information on how to submit your pitch.
- This month we published some updates to our Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Action Plan, which include the implementation of a new feedback form for the freelancers we work with and an audit of the language used on our website.
Opportunities & Resources
- The next National Lottery Open Week will take place from 9 – 17 March 2024. Register to get involved and say thank you to National Lottery players by providing special offers such as free tickets or behind-the-scenes tours of your venue.
- BFI FAN: Green Hour is a new series of events for film exhibitors focusing on environmental sustainability. The first event, taking place on Monday 4 December, will consider how cinemas can reduce their digital carbon footprint.
- The BFI is inviting applications from UK exhibitors who have experience of screening immersive works to take part in a group attendance at South by Southwest (Austin, Texas) in March 2024.
- Applications have opened for a new, funded Collaborative Doctoral Award exploring Birmingham’s suburban cinema stories, supervised by Flatpack and the Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research at Birmingham City University.
- As part of the BFI Sustainable Screen Programme, Julie’s Bicycle is running a webinar for organisations working in the screen sector ‘beyond production’ (including cinemas, festivals and screen archives) looking to develop their commitment to meaningful, positive environmental change and put a plan in place to make it happen.
- On Thursday 14 December, the Audience Agency is hosting a webinar that will take you through the process for creating an audience development plan that you can put into practice straight away to help you successfully retain audiences and reach new ones.
- Aged 18-23, based in the UK, and have a passion for documentary and the media industry? Applications for Sheffield DocFest’s Youth Jury are open until Friday 12 June.
- All In is a new UK-wide arts access scheme for D/deaf, disabled, and neurodivergent people. The scheme is currently in development, but they plan to help cultural organisations improve access, welcome new visitors, and increase overall attendance.
- Watersprite Film Festival, the world’s largest student film festival, is looking for students from around the UK to join their Watersprite Ambassador programme. Apply by Monday 4 December.
- On 6 December, the Digital Culture Network is running a short webinar on the basics of audience data collection.
- Film Hub Wales has updated their environmentally themed programme pack with the help of curator Rachel Pronger. It now contains over 280 film suggestions, with rights information included, to help you plan climate-themed screenings and events.
- There are currently roles available at the BFI, Borderlines Film Festival, Genesis Cinema, The Castle Cinema, Showroom Workstation and more.
Good Reads
- Blaxpoitation, from Shaft to Original Ganstas
- Who does Hollywood want Black women to be?
- Flick lit: writing in the dark
- Iranian cinema before the revolution
- On Heinz Edelmann and the ‘Grosses Kino’ film poster exhibition
- Curator Jonathan Ali on the cutting edge of Caribbean cinema
- On Tod Browning’s carnivalesque provocations
- On Claude Chabrol’s late-career triumph, La cérémonie
- How Abel Gance’s Napoleon was restored to full glory
- On Gerald Kargl’s controversial 1983 serial-killer flick, Angst
- Palestine in exile in Tewfik Saleh’s The Dupes
- Thelma Schoonmaker on striking scenes in the work of Powell & Pressburger
- Music from the films of Hirokazu Kore-eda (listen)
- On the ending of Barbara Loden’s Wanda
- On misrepresentations of spoken language in Western films set in Africa
- The black cat audition in Hollywood, 1961
- Sandra Hüller & Joachim Trier discuss the art of anti-storytelling
- On the films of Ritwik Ghatak
- Seven ways of looking at the ghosts of cinema
- Facing the future of cinema with Locarno’s Kevin B. Lee
- On three of the most seductive onscreen adaptations of the writing of Eileen Chang
- Guy Maddin in conversation with Courtney Stephens
- On Jill, Uncredited, a moving-image portrait of prolific background actor Jill Goldston
Header image: Tallinn, home of the Black Nights Film Festival