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Disrupting the Narrative brings together 10 exciting filmmakers that are doing just that by using innovative animation techniques to explore a wider framework about and beyond race. The films celebrate the rich cultural diversity of black voices and British lives using animation, documentary, and avant-garde experimental techniques to explore themes of identity, race, family, cultural taboos, genre, gender and the shared joy of play that pushes the art form to the outer limits.
Hand-drawn animation exists side by side with digital animation, documentary footage with scratch animation, stop-motion clashes with collage, experimental with figurative – unravelling a series of surprising stories for greater understanding of differential perception across different classes and cultures around the world.
This thought-provoking collection of films highlights an important, and under-acknowledged, area of narrative and non-narrative animation by Black British and ethnically diverse filmmakers working in the animation industry today.
There will be a panel discussion after the screening with filmmakers Osbert Parker, Mary Martins, Ezra Myers, Jessica Ashman and Isabel Barfod moderated by Debbie Meniru (at the Barbican only).
Disrupting the Narrative (Black voices, British lives) was co-curated with Osbert Parker – BAFTA and Emmy nominated Director and Ambassador for FLAMIN at Film London.
Dawta – Jessica Ashman, UK
Inspired by archival research into trans-racial adoption and her own family history, Dawta is a story of escaping the past through the imagining of an unknown future; through the imagining of an unknown hope.
2021 7 min
Yellow Fever – Ng’endo Mukii, UK
The concept of skin and race, and what that implies; the ideas and theories sown into our flesh that change with the arc of time.
2012 7 min
Something More – Mary Martins, UK
An exploration of the cause of youth violence and the impact of knife crime in London seen through the eyes of a mother raising her 8 year-old son in London.
2022 5 min
Black Moon – Toby Cato, UK
In a bleak dystopian world beauty abounds in the shapes and rhythms that are all around.
2022 3 min
The Divide – Mary Martins, UK
Love can exist within challenging circumstances. A poignant look at how a child’s creativity causes his mother to experience moments of happiness, profound beauty and finally the acceptance of a new life.
2016 5 min
Disney+ clips from Growing Up (Amiri/Sage/Gavin/Emily) – Osbert Parker, UK
The challenges, triumphs and complexities of adolescence explored through the words of four young people on their paths to self-discovery and acceptance.
Production Company: Culture House
2022 6 min
Masso Awwo – Duncan Senkumba, UK
A journey through the beauty and chaos of Kampala city taxi park.
2016 3 min
The Sounds of Jordan – Ezra Myers, UK
A depiction of Trinidad’s chosen instrument, the steel pan – the magnitude of the instrument’s contribution to a once silenced community, which allowed broken souls to express and experience freedom.
2022 3 min
Visual Music – Osbert Parker, UK
A joyful depiction of music in motion using disposable everyday objects and the sound of big-band jazz.
work in progress 2 min
Sidesteps – Isabel Barfod, UK
Flowing through the current with whispers of ancient – and recent past -unseen forces pull, hinder, stun and refract.
2022 5 min
I Don’t Protest, I Just Dance In My Shadow – Jessica Ashman, UK
A visualisation of the joy, frustration, wishes and dreams of what it feels like to be a black woman and a woman of colour artist, creating and existing.
2017 5 min
Clothes – Osbert Parker, UK
Clothes dance gleefully to the sound of a big band jazz soundtrack.
1988 3 min
Sir John Lubbock’s Pet Wasp – Osbert Parker & Laurie Hill, UK
A bizarre and beautiful love story Inspired by the life and writings of Sir John Lubbock and an unnamed wasp.
2018 2 min
Yours Truly – Osbert Parker, UK
Characters burst through yesterday’s emulsion to tell the conflicting story of Frank and Charlie who sacrifice their morals to find love as two world’s collide.
2006 8 min
Robots of Brixton – Kibwe Tavares, UK
Brixton has degenerated into an area inhabited by London’s new robot workforce – robots built and designed to carry out all of the tasks which humans no longer want to do.
2011 6 min
The Invisibles – Edgar H Alvarez
A day in the life of the homeless on the streets of LA, the ones that survive or live in a different reality, youngsters with a broken dream, war veterans, drug addicts, lonely people with no family, victims of the economic or emotional crisis.
2013 6 min
Our Funding Partner
Event supported by Film Hub London, managed by Film London. Proud to be a partner of the BFI Film Audience Network, funded by the National Lottery.
