Scots festival celebrates female cinema and island culture

The Herald Scotland

5 days ago

The artistic director of the Sea Change Festival, which will be held on the remote Hebridean island between 19 and 21 September, explains:
'My parents were Scottish. After I became redundant, my auntie offered my grandad's house on Tiree, so my family and I moved there ten years ago.
'This was around the time of Me Too and a lot of great work was being done about increasing female representation in film. I remember going to an industry event and telling everyone about an idea I had about a female-led film festival.
'A few people offered to run sessions and help out. We received funding and started the first festival in 2018.'
Jen Skinner (L), alongside colleagues at the festival. (Image: Sea Change) Skinner says that the festival, which is associated with Screen Agryll and will feature the iconic mobile cinema 'the Screen Machine,' has been rebuilding since the Covid pandemic provoked a generational change in film watching.
Indeed, in the run-up to the festival, Screen Argyll will tour Mull, Coll, and Seil, screening a range of classic films directed by women at local venues across the islands.
While things have been 'a bit quieter' in recent years, Skinner is excited for this year's festival, which will focus on women in Scottish animation.
'The first festival really demonstrated how important it was to be on Tiree and how it benefited the community,' she notes.
'You have the chance to get away for a bit and watch a film under the big open skies. It brings out a different element, and it is really lovely how cinema can bring people together.'
Orcadian Amy Liptrot, author of the The Outrun, will introduce a special screening of the eponymous Saoirse Ronan film, while Shallow Grave star Kerry Fox will speak about some of her favourite collaborations with female directors including Fanny and Elvis and An Angel At My Table.
Skinner says: 'I'm delighted we will be welcoming Kerry Fox to the festival. It's bringing me full circle in a way. My first joh in cinema was managing the Hebden Bridge Picture House, and we'll be screening Fanny and Elvis, which was shot in Hebden Bridge.
'We are also welcoming Alison Gardner from the Glasgow Film Theatre. We've wanted to get her to Sea Change for a while. She'll be hosting an 'in conversation' discussion with Fox.'
Gardner will also take part in the Sea Change's industry programme; which will include practical sessions, networking opportunities, and one on one conversations.
An attendee takes part in a filmmaking session. (Image: Sea Change) The involvement of the local community is integral to the success of the festival, Skinner says, providing an example from a recent conversation.
'I was speaking to a local man who is very involved and sits on every community board there is on Tiree,' Skinner tells me.
'I told him how excited I was about The Rugged Island, an archival film about crofters on Shetland, and how we have two fiddle players coming to play for us as well. I said there was no excuse for him to come now!'
The Rugged Island, directed by Scottish filmmaker Jenny Gilbertson, has been praised as a 'tender and beautiful dramatisation of Shetland life,' and includes a live score by award-winning fiddlers Inge Thomson and Catriona McDonald.
'Last year, we made a Mama Mia film with 98 people from the local community,' she adds. We will hold sessions in the school and animation workshops with young people and families.'
The festival liaises with a range of local businesses, as Skinner notes: 'A wild bathing company from Oban will be holding seaweed baths and leading swimming sessions each morning. We also work with local providers to secure accommodation and run the cafe and organise activities.'
'What about funding,' I ask. Will the festival be able to weather the budget constraints of a world which seems to value the arts less and less.
Skinner responds: 'It is always difficult as we rely on year on year project funding. However, Screen Scotland has confirmed they will fund the festival for the next two years. That's been good as we can plan for the future.'
As we wrap up our conversation, I ask Skinner what her driving motivation is? Why should people spend a weekend on a remote island a four hour ferry ride from Oban?
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She pauses, before responding with consideration.
'It's important to increase representation on screen. Women working in the industry are still a small number, especially the higher up you go. There still aren't a lot of female directors,' Skinner says.
'We want to platform a range of different stories from those in the global majority and around the world.'
Indeed, the festival's programme is very diverse, ranging from Motherboard, branded as 'an epic look at solo motherhood shot over 20 years and 6 I-Phones' to Sister Midnight, a feminist punk comedy set in Mumbai, and Spanish film Sorda, which tells the story of a young Deaf woman trying to have a baby.'
Skinner sums it up well.
'You know, cinema can be political. The shared experience of watching a film together opens people up to different worlds and new ideas.'