Preview: Blackpool Film Festival

Leading ladies are called to the front this autumn with a series of femme-focussed films, events and workshops as a major strand of Blackpool Film Festival's 2024 programme.

Warming up to the main weekend of events, the festival kicks off quite literally at 2.30pm at Blackpool Sixth Form College on Thursday 24th October. Sugar, Spice and Getting in Fights is a stunt workshop for women and non binary people.

Led by an experienced stunt performer, participants will learn the most fun and gory techniques used by filmmakers to create realistic fight scenes before taking part in a post-workshop Q&A. This event is a friendly introduction to the work of women in stunt work and to the main festival programme which runs 1st-3rd November. It aims to enable under-represented performers to enter the industry and is inspired by the screening of Polite Society at The Backlot cinema on Sunday 3rd November.

To celebrate its 10th anniversary, the former Winter Gardens Film Festival was renamed Blackpool Film Festival (BFF) earlier this year to reflect its evolution into becoming a town-wide celebration of independent and diverse cinema. In April it hosted an introductory weekend of inaugural events championing young and queer filmmakers.

Founded in 2014, the festival fills a gap in Blackpool’s film offer, providing room for discussion about films and affordable screenings of diverse cinema – from independent and art house, to shorts, documentary, locally-made and foreign-language productions. Now an independent organisation and a multi-venue festival, it includes main screenings at the new Backlot Cinema alongside talks and workshops at fringe venues.

As part of the festival’s commitment to opening up opportunities for local talent, the main programme begins at 6pm on Friday 1st November at the Backlot with a Filmmaker’s Mixer hosted by the BFI Network. This informal, conversational meet-up will be a great opportunity for creatives to connect with the growing community of local Film and TV industry folk, share stories and meet future collaborators.

Those attending the free event will hear from Film Hub Talent Executives about funding and development opportunities available through BFI Network, plus getting the chance to chat to representatives from our partners working in the region.

Capturing filmmaking talent young, at 11am on Saturday 2nd November, families with children aged 8 and up are invited to take part in a free Barbie Stop-Motion Workshop. Led by @VintageBarbieClare, participants will learn how to animate dolls and miniatures and leave with their very own mini movie masterpiece.

Female Power is invoked again on Saturday afternoon during a witchy cult classic with a crafty twist. Dig out your sketchbook and dust off those crochet hooks for a craft-along screening of teen horror The Craft (1996, cert 15).

After transferring to a new high school, new girl Sarah befriends a group of three wannabe witches, a group of misfits who happen to be seeking a fourth member to complete their coven. During this screening, audience members have the option of enjoying their own creative crafty activity such as knitting, crochet, cross stitch, drawing or paper based crafts while watching the film. Pumpkin sewing craft kits will also be available to purchase.

On Saturday night at 8pm audiences are invited to strap on those cha cha heels for an evening of depraved decadence introduced by special guest, drag queen Titty Kaka, at Backlot. A collaboration with multi art-form festival, BFF will screen John Waters’ 1974 sleazy smash hit Female Trouble.

Led by her egomaniacal impulses, teenage nightmare Dawn Davenport (Divine) drops out of school to seek fame as a glamorous model. She’ll get pregnant, join the criminal underworld and conduct a crime spree as part of a strange art experiment. The event will start with a showing of a new short film work by James Barnett which documents this year’s Queer Amusements festival. This will be introduced by festival Creative Director Harry Clayton-Wright.

Clayton-Wright said: “Queers in Blackpool features interviews, archive material and beautiful new footage of Funny Girls veteran Titty Kaka in and across iconic Blackpool locations. The film explores queer culture and the arts, Blackpool representation and its reputation, plus all the exciting things we’ve been up to with year one of the Queer Amusements festival.

“James’s work is smart, snappy, funny, never takes itself too seriously, is always high end and is rich in its detail and storytelling.”

Events take a more polite turn on Sunday with two heritage talks at Blackpool museum of entertainment, Showtown.

At 11am on 3rd November, collections manager Caroline Hall will host A Hard Night’s Day, screening footage from her father’s time working in cinema for the very first time. This beautiful and nostalgic short film will be followed by a Q&A. And at 2pm Blackpool Cinemas Heritage Talk will reveal the history of Blackpool’s important role in cinema during the golden era of the big screen.

Meanwhile at Backlot at 2pm, the debut film by British writer-director Nida Manzoor, Polite Society (2023, cert 12) follows martial artist-in-training, Ria Khan (Priya Kansara) in a joyous mashup of familial affection and roundhouse kicks as she battles to save her sister from her looming marriage.

Part of the BFI Art of Action season, the screening is followed by an exclusive panel discussion hosted by women’s organisation, Reclaim Blackpool. It will provide insightful commentary and industry knowledge from special guests, including Polite Society stunt performer Francesca Cozier, and other professionals from the world of action.

In the spirit of spooky season, the festival rounds off on Sunday evening at 7pm with Scarred For Life – a special event at Backlot for the children of the ‘70s and ‘80s whose childhoods were traumatised by Worzel Gummidge, Doctor Who and Day of the Triffids.

Liverpool writers Stephen Brotherstone and Dave Lawrence – the men behind the superb Scarred For Life books – will be giving a hilarious talk and hosting a Q&A about the TV, films, music, comics, board games, books, adverts and crisps (no, really) that blighted our childhoods.

Other events are ongoing throughout the weekend and beyond. Abingdon Studios hosts In The Shadow Of… an exhibition by Kris Canavan. Exploring the body as both site and subject through film archive, photography, and mixed media, the exhibition draws on Canavan’s visceral performance work and its self-expressive, experimental and profound social and political implications.

Intersections of film and art are also explored at The Grundy Art Gallery where artist-filmmaker Steven Eastwood and The Neurocultures Collective present Stim Cinema. Stimming is the practice of physical repetition as a way of taking sensory pleasure in recurrence, or of expressing and alleviating anxiety, and is a common trait of autistic experience. The exhibition Includes zoetropes (early moving image / pre cinematic devices), an 18-minute looped video, and props and ephemera from the production process.

Blackpool Film Festival is supported by Film Hub North, the National Lottery, the British Film Institute (BFI) Film Audience Network and local arts organisation Aunty Social.

Festival director Catherine Mugonyi said: “Overwhelmingly, over the last ten years of the Winter Gardens Film Festival, people have shown up for Blackpool film. They’ve been really supportive of Blackpool producers, directors, and people working in the film industry. That’s only going to get stronger now that Blackpool Film Festival is standing on its own two feet.

“We often hear about the cultural brain drain of people moving away from Blackpool in order to access opportunity. Let’s start here. Let’s show them they have opportunity on their doorstep and that people appreciate it.”

All events at BFF24 are free or affordable. For more information on individual events and to book visit: https://www.blackpoolfilm.co.uk/programme-2024/