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CAMBRIDGE DOC FILM DAY 12 OCT 2024
The UK boasts one of the finest documentary film festivals in Europe, yet one is much more likely to encounter documentaries on screens at home rather than in a cinema. There is but one cinema devoted to documentary films nationwide. In this inaugural documentary day in Cambridge we will screen the DocFest 2024 Audience Award Winner ‘Strike: An Uncivil War’ followed by the much-lauded ‘A Story of Bones’ in honour and respect of Black History Month. Screenings will be held in the Frankopan Hall, Jesus College. Tickets are available below.
STRIKE: AN UNCIVIL WAR 2024, 111 mins (15) UK
Directed by: Daniel Gordon
Saturday 12 October @ 3.30pm
(followed by pre-recorded Q&A)
Daniel Gordon’s feature documentary STRIKE: AN UNCIVIL WAR tells the story of the Battle of Orgreave, the most violent confrontation between Miners and Police during the 1984/85 Miners’ Strike in Great Britain.
Using powerful personal testimony, previously hidden government documents, and a treasure trove of never-before-seen archive material, we are taken back to the notorious day at Orgreave, 18th June 1984.
The Miners’ Strike cut right to the heart of Britain’s social and political consciousness.
It was about more than the economics of coal mines and encompassed regionality, class, community, masculinity, the role of women, relationships, marriage and family.
Once ignited, the conflict spread from southeast England, the Midlands and the North, to the coalfields of Wales and Scotland.
Witness the stories and recollections of the people on the front lines of this incredible moment in time—which split communities and the nation—and a hurt which is still felt to this very day.
★★★★ “A tough, valuable, forthright film.”—Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
★★★★★
“Outstanding.”
—Maria Duarte, The Morning Star
★★★★ (4.5) “Powerful and thorough.”—Amber Wilkinson, Eye For Film
★★★★ (4.5) “Has an importance which transcends party politics”—Mansel Stimpston, Film Review Daily
A STORY OF BONES 2024, 95 mins (12A) UK
Directed by: Joseph Curran & Dominic Aubrey de Vere
Saturday 12 October @ 6pm
Saint Helena island—a tiny British Overseas Territory in the middle of the South Atlantic Ocean—is so remote that the only means of arrival is the world’s last Royal Mail Ship, a six-day journey from Cape Town. For centuries, Saint Helena has existed in near isolation from the rest of the world, a potent symbol of Britain’s colonial past, epitomized by its most famous tourist attraction, Napoleon Bonaparte’s empty tomb.
As the Environmental Officer for Saint Helena’s troubled £285m airport project, Annina Van Neel learned of the island’s most terrible atrocity – an unmarked mass burial ground of an estimated 9,000 formerly enslaved Africans. It is one of the most significant traces of the transatlantic slave trade still on earth.
Haunted by this historical injustice, Annina fights alongside renowned African American preservationist Peggy King Jorde and a group of disenfranchised islanders – many of them descendants of enslaved people – for the proper memorialisation of these forgotten victims. The resistance they face exposes disturbing truths about the UK’s colonial past – and present.
In charting her years-long journey to this moment of catharsis, A STORY OF BONES documents Annina’s extraordinary transformation from a disempowered bystander to an undaunted social justice activist—and one who is determined to advocate for a community that has long been denied a voice.
★★★★ “A moving, empathic story”—Leslie Felperin, The Guardian
★★★★ “A gripping, thought-provoking film”—Danny Leigh, Financial Times
★★★★ “A Story of Bones is of global historical significance, told at a human level that will at once move and outrage you”—John Bleasdale, The Times
★★★★ “Powerful and sobering”—Maria Duarte, Morning Star
★★★★ Total Film
FINDING THE VENUE
Screenings will take place in the Frankopan Hall, which is located in West Court, Jesus College. The pedestrian entrance can be accessed from Jesus Lane. Please see the detailed map below for further information.
WITH THANKS TO
