Up the Middle Road: Crichton Stories of Resilience and Recovery (N/C 12+)
- RBC Film Theatre Mill Road Dumfries, Scotland, DG2 7BE United Kingdom (map)
Click on film title below for more info.
Related Content:
Based on Isabella Tree’s best-selling book by the same title, this documentary tells the story of a young couple that bets on nature for the future of their failing, four-hundred-year-old estate.
The young couple battles entrenched tradition, and dares to place the fate of their farm in the hands of nature. Ripping down the fences, they set the land back to the wild and entrust its recovery to a motley mix of animals both tame and wild. It is the beginning of a grand experiment that will become one of the most significant rewilding experiments in Europe.
Rescheduled from 18 June.
On 18 June 1984, at the height of the 1984-85 Miners’ Strike, Orgreave Coking Plant in South Yorkshire became the site of the bloodiest day of the longest and most violent industrial dispute in British history. The media subsequently appeared to lay blame for the violence at the feet of the strikers. Daniel Gordon’s comprehensive documentary doesn’t just overturn this fabrication, it portrays what took place as planned action on the part of the Thatcher government, with the Prime Minister determined to seek redress for the National Miners’ Union’s victory over the Conservative government in the early 1970s and to forever break the union’s role at the heart of British working class society. Released on the 40th anniversary of the battle, and featuring first-hand accounts and archive footage, this is a searing portrait of that tragic event.
Maya Angelou’s ode to Rabbie Burns.
Dr. Maya Angelou, the African-American writer and poet, discovered and was inspired by the work of Robert Burns at the age of 8. She was mute and living in a small hamlet in Arkansas. "He was the first white man I read who seemed to understand that a human being was a human being and we are more alike than unalike".
The film follows Maya Angelou on a pilgrimage to Burns country in which she explores the strong parallels that exist in their lives - poor beginnings, early love of literature, fame, liberty and equality, music, religion, love and passion - and meets the enthusiastic and fanatical Burnsians, who welcome her to ceilidhs in Ayrshire and Edinburgh in honour of her visit and Burns' genius.
First broadcast in 1996 to commemorate the bicentenary of Burns’ death, we are screening the documentary in partnership with Dumfries and Galloway Pensioners for Independence to mark the anniversary of his death. The group promotes Scottish Independence but are not linked to any political party. They welcome Angelou’s observation that “poems transcend race, time and space” and her recognition that Burns is a symbol for “freedom and Scotland’s dignity, independence and humanity”.
We are delighted to welcome Hugh McMillan, poet and writer for post-film discussion.
The film screening will feature an introduction and post-film discussion led by Dr Connor McMorran.
Blurring the lines between reality and fiction, this fascinating film by trans writer, philosopher and activist Paul B. Preciado – a leading figure in the study of gender and body politics – is a playful, moving, metatextual documentary expanding Virginia Woolf’s novel Orlando: A Biography, in which the protagonist changes gender midway through the story to become a 36-year-old woman.
A century after Woolf wrote her novel, Preciado decides to send her a cinematic letter telling her that Orlando has emerged from her fiction to live a life she could never have imagined, organising a casting that brings together 26 contemporary trans and non-binary people, aged 8 to 70, to embody the character. Reconstructing the stages of his own personal transformation through authentic voices, writings, theory and images, Preciado’s meticulous, bracingly intellectual yet highly accessible film eschews pigeonholes, inviting us to see instead how everything is constantly in flux.
18 spectacular months in the life of an incredible 210-year-old oak tree.
A lot of things happen around an old oak tree: squirrels chase acorns, jays are fiercely pursued by a hawk in wild action stunts, insects buzz, wild boars visit to rub their bristles. Heart of an Oak tells a sensuous, wordless story of the beautiful cycle of nature and how life hums along with innumerable connections between flora and fauna – as the oak’s branches leaf and reach out into the sky, and its incredible network of roots forge new life underground.
Based on Isabella Tree’s best-selling book by the same title, this documentary tells the story of a young couple that bets on nature for the future of their failing, four-hundred-year-old estate.
The young couple battles entrenched tradition, and dares to place the fate of their farm in the hands of nature. Ripping down the fences, they set the land back to the wild and entrust its recovery to a motley mix of animals both tame and wild. It is the beginning of a grand experiment that will become one of the most significant rewilding experiments in Europe.
Based on Isabella Tree’s best-selling book by the same title, this documentary tells the story of a young couple that bets on nature for the future of their failing, four-hundred-year-old estate.
The young couple battles entrenched tradition, and dares to place the fate of their farm in the hands of nature. Ripping down the fences, they set the land back to the wild and entrust its recovery to a motley mix of animals both tame and wild. It is the beginning of a grand experiment that will become one of the most significant rewilding experiments in Europe.
Screened in collaboration with sustainable food organisation Propagate, who will host a discussion with members of the South West Scotland Regenerative Farming Network and other food thinkers from the region.
Six Inches of Soil, tells the story of remarkable farmers, communities, small businesses, chefs and entrepreneurs who are leading the way to transform how our food is produced and consumed. The documentary tells the inspiring story of young British farmers standing up against the industrial food system and transforming the way they produce food - to heal the soil, our health and provide for local communities.
Six Inches of Soil is a story of three new farmers on the first year of their regenerative journey to heal the soil and help transform the food system - Anna Jackson, a Lincolnshire 11th generation arable and sheep farmer; Adrienne Gordon, a Cambridgeshire small-scale vegetable farmer; and Ben Thomas, who rears pasture fed beef cattle in Cornwall.
The fun begins at 10.30am with a story or sing-along, followed by a short film or collection of short films for really wee ones. This time it’s the TV adaptation of the popular series of children's books by Janet and Allan Ahlberg about the comical adventures of two skeletons and their skeletal dog. Narrated by comedian Griff Rhys Jones.
- Tagged: October, Documentary, Q&A