Every film by a black direc­tor at the 2016 BFI Lon­don Film Festival

With the BFI’s upcom­ing Black Star sea­son, which cel­e­brates the work of black actors through­out the years, and David Oyelowo head­ing up a sym­po­sium on racial equal­i­ty on Thurs­day 6 Octo­ber, this year’s BFI Lon­don Film Fes­ti­val sees a major push for diver­si­ty in the movie industry.

David Oyelowo has said, ​“I’m real­ly hope­ful we’re about to segue from talk­ing about diver­si­ty to actu­al­ly doing it.” In response to that, we’ve com­piled a list of every film – 20 in total – made by a black film­mak­er screen­ing as part of this year’s offi­cial LFF pro­gramme. The show­cas­ing of these works is a step in the right direc­tion, giv­ing audi­ences the oppor­tu­ni­ty to sam­ple a wide array of dif­fer­ent cul­tures, pol­i­tics and sto­ry­telling traditions.

Direct­ed by Ava DuVer­nay (USA)
Doc­u­men­tary Spe­cial Pre­sen­ta­tion
Tick­ets

Long before her bril­liant 2015 Mar­tin Luther King biopic, Sel­ma, Ava DuVer­nay has been a key voice in telling sto­ries link­ing to America’s con­stant strug­gle with racial prej­u­dice. Her new doc­u­men­tary, named after the amend­ment in the bill of rights that banned slav­ery, is an inter­ro­ga­tion of the Amer­i­can judi­cial sys­tem and its racial prej­u­dices. It’s a vital ret­ro­spec­tive look at what the 13^th amend­ment means in mod­ern day USA.

Direct­ed by Izu Ojuk­wu (Nige­ria)
Thrill
Tick­ets

Dubbed Nigeria’s most excit­ing direc­tor, Izu Ojuk­wu cre­ates sprawl­ing, dra­mat­ic sto­ries. His lat­est film is a sto­ry about the 1976 assas­si­na­tion of the mil­i­tary ruler of the time, Gen­er­al Mur­ta­la Mohammed. Nol­ly­wood great Ram­sey Nouah plays a young offi­cer who enters a rela­tion­ship with a woman from the south east (Rita Dominic). When she learns of his rebel­lious activ­i­ty against the country’s lead­er­ship, their rela­tion­ship is thrown into disarray.

Direct­ed by Nate Park­er (USA)
Head­line Gala
Tick­ets

Writ­ten, direct­ed, pro­duced and star­ring Nate Park­er, The Birth of a Nation tells the true sto­ry of a preach­er who led a slave revolt in Vir­ginia in 1831. A man of God, Nat Turn­er is used by his white own­ers to sup­press dis­sent with­in the slave pop­u­lace. Unwill­ing to see so many forced to live like this, he starts a thun­der­ous uprising.

Direct­ed by Lizzie Bor­den (USA)
Exper­i­men­ta, Trea­sures from the Archive
Tick­ets

A sci­ence fic­tion fan­ta­sy with a fem­i­nist angle, Lizzie Borden’s new­ly restored 1986 film pro­vides a social com­men­tary that feels as rel­e­vant today as ever. Set in a futur­is­tic USA, it’s a fic­tion­al doc­u­men­tary about a soci­ety that has reached social equal­i­ty but not gen­der equal­i­ty. Through inter­views and mocked-up archive footage we wit­ness a female upris­ing tak­ing place in this clas­sic tale of empow­er­ment and female identity.

Direct­ed by Spike Lee (USA)
Son­ic Gala
Tick­ets

Ever cur­rent and ever impres­sive, Spike Lee is back on the moviemak­ing scene with a char­ac­ter­is­ti­cal­ly bold cre­ation – a daz­zling hip-hop musi­cal loose­ly based on the ancient Greek com­e­dy ​‘Lysis­tra­ta’. The orig­i­nal sto­ry sees a woman per­suade the female pop­u­lace to with­held sex­u­al priv­i­leges in order to end a long stand­ing war. Here though, the action is trans­ferred to gang­land war­fare in Chica­go. It’s a unique and inven­tive way of under­stand­ing gen­der and gun crime in the USA.

Direct­ed by Julie Dash (USA)
Jour­ney, Trea­sures from the Archive
Tick­ets

Julie Dash’s first fea­ture film, Daugh­ters of the Dust remains an impact­ing, com­pact sto­ry about three gen­er­a­tions of women direct­ly descend­ed from West African slaves. Set at the begin­ning of the 20^th cen­tu­ry, it fol­lows their sto­ry as they up sticks and move from their off shore Island in South Car­oli­na to the main­land. Orig­i­nal­ly released in 1991, it’s recent­ly been restored and well worth catching.

Direct­ed by Mahamat Saleh Haroun (France, Chad)
Debate, Doc­u­men­tary Com­pe­ti­tion
Tick­ets

Born in Chad, Mahamat Saleh Haroun moved to France in 1982. In this new doc­u­men­tary, he looks at the pain his home coun­try felt under the dic­ta­to­r­i­al régime of His­sein Habré, a ruler that led an oppres­sive régime over the peo­ple of Chad, send­ing around 40,000 peo­ple to die in the country’s pris­ons. He talks to some of the vic­tims of the atro­cious period.

Direct­ed by Bar­ry Jenk­ins (USA)
Offi­cial com­pe­ti­tion
Tick­ets

The high­ly-antic­i­pat­ed third fea­ture from Bar­ry Jenk­ins is a study of a young black man strug­gling to define his sex­u­al­i­ty in 1980s Mia­mi. Adapt­ed from the play ​‘In Moon­light Black Boys Look Blue’, it fol­lows him from child­hood to adult­hood. Ear­ly buzz sug­gests this is one that’s not to be missed.

Direct­ed by Shola Amoo (UK)
Debate
Tick­ets

Pitched as a mul­ti­me­dia fea­ture film, Shola Amoo blends doc­u­men­tary, art and per­for­mance. Part fic­tion, part non-fic­tion, it’s a top­i­cal film about gen­tri­fi­ca­tion in Lon­don. Focussing on Nina, a young artist in Brix­ton, it’s a local sto­ry about how the cap­i­tal is chang­ing and how that alters the lives of those that have always lived there.

Direct­ed by Ramia Thi­aw (France, Sene­gal)
Debate
Tick­ets

Filmed over sev­er­al years, Ramia Thiaw’s doc­u­men­tary records a new polit­i­cal move­ment for young peo­ple in Sene­gal. In 2011, after hav­ing been pres­i­dent of Sene­gal for 10 years, Abdoulaye Wade want­ed to run for office again. In protest to the same old sto­ry of an old­er man run­ning the coun­try, a dri­ve was start­ed by the country’s young peo­ple. A move­ment called Y’en a marre (lit­er­al­ly, ​“we’re fed up”) gained trac­tion. Here, Thi­aw fol­lows their rise and the country’s cry for change.

Direct­ed by Amma Assante (UK)
Open­ing Night Gala
Tick­ets

Star­ring Rosamund Pike and David Oyelowo, A Unit­ed King­dom is the true sto­ry of the rela­tion­ship that blos­somed in 1948 between ordi­nary Lon­don­er Ruth Williams and king of Bechua­na­land, Seretse Khama. When they meet at a dance, sparks fly and they start a rela­tion­ship against all advice. Then, when Seretse must leave to be king of Bechua­na­land, Ruth decides to fol­low him by his side. When their inter­ra­cial rela­tion­ship becomes known, they must hold fast and stay togeth­er as forces unhap­py with their bond strive to keep them apart.

Direct­ed by Rah­ma­tou Keï­ta (Niger, Burk­i­na Faso, France)
Love
Tick­ets

All the way from Niger, The Wed­ding Ring fol­lows a girl from a sig­nif­i­cant fam­i­ly in South East Niger. After meet­ing a young man from near­by dur­ing her edu­ca­tion abroad, she arrives back to wait for him to vis­it her. In that time she learns how her friends and fam­i­ly define the con­cept of love.

Direct­ed by Joseph A Adesun­loye (UK)
Jour­ney
Tick­ets

Hav­ing been born in Nige­ria and grown up in Lon­don, this is a sto­ry that relates close­ly to the director’s own life. Focussing on a young mul­tira­cial Lon­don­er, the film fol­lows him as he traces his roots back in Sene­gal. It’s a close study of iden­ti­ty and what it means to be ​‘from’ somewhere.

Direct­ed by Daou­da Coulibaly (France, Sene­gal)
First Fea­ture Com­pe­ti­tion
Tick­ets

A sto­ry of good peo­ple doing bad things, Wulu fol­lows a hard work­ing bus dri­ver from Bamiko, Sene­gal try­ing to make enough to save his sis­ter from a life of pros­ti­tu­tion. Lad­ji (Ibrahim Koma) makes pit­tance. In an effort to make a change, he vis­its a local drug leader, ask­ing for a job. From one per­ilous job to anoth­er, the film charts his rise from bus dri­ver to drug-traf­fick­ing overlord.

Direct­ed by Lamin Daniel Jadama, Lars Lovén, Göran Hugo Ols­son (Swe­den, Ger­many, Switzer­land)
Son­ic, Doc­u­men­tary Com­pe­ti­tion
Tick­ets

A cul­tur­al voy­age through Africa, Fonko is a doc­u­men­tary about social change and the cul­tur­al make­up of one of the world’s most diverse, chang­ing con­ti­nents. Cov­er­ing the huge area, the film is com­prised of inter­views with musi­cians and artists from South to North, com­ment­ing on every­thing from art styles to social and polit­i­cal issues that have rav­aged areas of the continent.

Direct­ed by Moritz Siebert, Estephan Wag­n­er, Abou Bakar Sidibé (Den­mark)
Jour­ney, Doc­u­men­tary Com­pe­ti­tion
Tick­ets

Those Who Jump​’s co-direc­tor Abou Bakar Sidibé is the focus of this new doc­u­men­tary. A young refugee from Malia, Sidibé camps in the moun­tains near Span­ish city Melil­la in North Africa. Giv­en a cam­era by Moritz Siebert, the film is a por­trait of his life as a migrant. It’s an account of his dai­ly life, his tem­po­rary home and his dreams for the future.

Direct­ed by Alice Diop (France)
Doc­u­men­tary com­pe­ti­tion
Tick­ets

Filmed over the course of a year, this time­ly film looks at the strug­gles asy­lum seek­ers find in a new coun­try. Filmed in a hos­pi­tal in Paris, it accounts vis­its from des­per­ate peo­ple as they arrive for dire­ly need­ed treat­ment, still wait­ing for their fate to be decid­ed by authorities.

Direct­ed by Dionne Edwards (UK)
Jour­ney, Lon­don Call­ing
Tick­ets

A 12-year-old girl grows an obses­sion with her brother’s best friend in this short from Lon­don-based film­mak­er Dionne Edwards.

Direct­ed by Kevin Jerome Ever­son (USA)
Exper­i­men­ta, Return­ing and Repris­ing
Tick­ets

In this short film by Amer­i­can direc­tor Kevin Jerome Ever­son, a woman recounts a trau­mat­ic shoot­ing she wit­nessed dur­ing a rou­tine med­ical examination.

Direct­ed by Ako­sua Ado­ma Owusu (USA, Ghana)
Exper­i­men­ta
Tick­ets

Ghan­ian-Amer­i­can avant-garde film­mak­er brings her new film to the LFF, about a young man from Ghana open­ing up about his sexuality.

The Lon­don Film Fes­ti­val runs 5 – 16 Octo­ber. For more info vis­it bfi​.org​.uk/lff