This page will continue to be updated with information and relevant links.
We want to share the following information, which you might need during coming weeks/months:
Hub Updates:
Government Guidance and Funds:
BFI:
Partner Funds and Advice:
We will update you as soon as we have any new information and we are on hand to help if we can do anything to support you. Our utmost concern is that you are all well and that we can work together to keep cinemas, festivals and events running in the long term.
As the lead organisation for film, we will support our many industry colleagues during this fast moving and rapidly evolving situation, and we are in discussion with key partners, stakeholders and Government to urgently assess the scale of the short and longer term impact on business.
We are focused on ensuring the resilience of the industry and on tackling the huge range of short to mid-term financial, cultural and societal challenges – not least to the exhibition and freelance sectors who are likely to be hit hardest most immediately by the crisis.
The BFI is in constant communication with colleagues in Government and with other funders across the sector, to ensure we all fully understand the ramifications of the most critical issues, and help shape measures to address them.
We have an already established Screen Sector Taskforce which will be convening to coordinate our conversation with Government and discuss the potential mitigations. We also urge practitioners across the industry and cultural sector to contact us with their key concerns and have set up an email address as a centralised point for all enquires covid-19.queries@bfi.org.uk to feed into our impact response recommendations.
As a funder, we will be as supportive and flexible as possible across existing funding arrangements, including the ability of those organisations and projects to meet contractual requirements.
As a production financier, we are obviously supporting our filmmakers with advice on a case by case basis. They are all different projects, each case is different and complex with completely different variables, so there isn’t one size fits all guidance, and we are advising them through these very particular challenges as best we can.
The BFI is working hard to support everyone across the sector during this extremely challenging time and we will update you with more news and information when we can.
Ben Roberts, Chief Executive, BFI
“That fertile legacy from the past century” was how Dave Berry, Wales’s much-missed film historian referred to Welsh screen culture. It is now being honoured in a completely new way – with a series of film screenings throughout Wales to promote the publication of an innovative free-to-download app, Picturing Our Past/Fframio’n Gorffennol, which will tell the story of Welsh film and television by combining text and film inserts in one free product.
The screenings, organised by the National Library of Wales Screen and Sound Archive with the support of Film Hub Wales as part of the BFI Film Audience Network (FAN), will pair a film from the past with a more recent production. On 27 February, at the Phoenix Cinema, Ton Pentre, the 1937 documentary Today We Live (1937), with its famous shots of miners scrabbling on a coal tip, will be shown with the heart-warming, award-winning documentary Dark Horse (2015), about the celebrated racehorse bought and trained by a Cefn Fforest syndicate. Then on 5 March at Yr Egin, Carmarthen, composer John Rea’s powerful new film Atgyfodi will be paired with Tryweryn – the Story of a Valley (1965) – made by the pupils of Friars School, Bangor.
On 23 March the Coliseum Cinema, Brecon will be screening Coming Up Roses/Rhosyn a Rhith (1987), a gentle comedy that is a joyous celebration of cinema itself, portraying the plight of the much-loved Rex in Aberdare, together with Cinema Memories, a short film recording the reminiscences of Cwm Afan residents of movie-going and working in the cinema. The star of the main film, Dafydd Hywel, will join the audience for a Q+A at the end of this showing, and also at the later screening in Theatr Twm o’r Nant, Denbigh on 3 April, where it will be paired with the award-winning documentary short Dial-a-Ride. The tour will conclude on 29 May with the new bitter-sweet Welsh comedy Denmark at Sinema Sadwrn, Llansadwrn.
The app Picturing Our Past/Fframio’n Gorffennol, supported by the Books Council of Wales, brings Dave Berry’s pioneering book Wales and Cinema up-to-date and digital technology enables its authors, Colin Thomas and Iola Baines, to include extracts from key films from Wales’s cinematic past.
Iola Baines, Moving Image Curator at The National Library of Wales Screen and Sound Archive explains:
Our aim in launching this app is to introduce new audiences and enthusiasts to Wales’s rich film and cinema heritage – and we are proud to include living, breathing examples to illustrate this history, in the form of moving image extracts from each era. We hope that this enhanced e-book will inspire people to delve deeper into this fascinating history, unearthing the people and stories behind the films they discover – and perhaps being moved to add to the history by creating and filming their own stories!
Colin Thomas, a TV producer/director of who made the Welsh history series The Dragon Has Two Tongues and is three times winner of BAFTA Cymru’s Best Documentary and a Prix Europa, adds
It’s exciting to be able to honour the Welsh filmmaking tradition to which I have tried to make a contribution, and to enable a new generation to discover how rich that tradition is.
Pedr ap Llwyd, Chief Executive and Librarian of The National Library of Wales, said:
This new e-book is an exciting and innovative way of presenting the National Library’s rich audiovisual collection, offering users a fresh and contemporary pathway to engage with this inspiring heritage. Furthermore, the film tour promoting the e-book is an excellent way to take our collection of films ‘on the road’, reaching out to audiences in the four corners of Wales who may never before have experienced heritage film on the big screen, or made the connection between ‘the new and the old’ in terms of Welsh cinema.
Hana Lewis, Film Hub Wales’s Strategic Manager adds:
Picturing our Past fuses new screen technologies with Welsh heritage, taking an innovative approach to audience development for films with Welsh connections. This is a fantastic new resource and we’re delighted to support The National Library of Wales Screen and Sound Archive as they bring these important stories to cinemas across Wales.
The app will be officially launched in May with a special event in Cardiff.
To raise the profile of the existing youth ticketing schemes at FAN member venues we’ve developed a new partnership with the Art Fund’s Student Art Pass which aims to give independent cinemas in the UK some additional profile.
COLLABORATIVE OPPORTUNITY
If you have a ticket offer of £5 or less for 16-25 year olds (or if your general ticket offer is £5 or less) they’d like to profile your cinema and offer to their student membership. The partnership will run for a year from the 25th February and will continue if successful. All we need to add your cinema to their offer is details about your venue, your ticket prices and a lovely image! Venues will be added on a rolling basis over the year but the more we have on board by the 25th February the better.
Film Hub Wales (FHW), led by Chapter as part of the BFI Film Audience Network, has announced two pioneering new projects that will champion Welsh storytelling across Wales, the UK and internationally.
Supported by Creative Wales and developed in consultation with Welsh screen organisations, an exciting new role will be created for a Made in Wales Officer. Building on the work of FHW to date, the post holder will explore ways of bringing Welsh film to public audiences, ensuring that regional stories, talent and locations are at the forefront. Details of the post can be found on Film Hub Wales’ website.
Also underway, is a piece of research into the potential of Made in Wales as a recognisable brand. Funded by Clwstwr, the project will explore the possible cultural and economic impact of a national brand for films with Welsh connections.
At Abertoir Corp’s 2019 edition of the festival, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Alien and their sci-fi theme, Abertoir attempted something literally out of this world…Abertoir, IN SPACE!
Teaming up with one of the writers of Alien, Ron Shusett, they recorded a very special introduction to the screening of the iconic film.
Before the festival, Ron’s video was loaded onto a computer attached to a special balloon capable of travelling to the edges of space. There, a mounted camera recorded Ron’s introduction playing back against the backdrop of our planet. The resulting footage was screened before the 40th anniversary screening of Alien on the closing day of the festival.
As a special thanks, Abertoir included Film Hub Wales, BFI Fan, the Institute of Physics, Aberystwyth University, Aberystwyth Arts Centre and Ffilm Cymru in the launch!
The SXSW Film Festival celebrates raw innovation and emerging talent from both behind and in front of the camera and this year it features two Made in Wales films in it’s programme.
Rockfield: The Studio on the Farm, a feature-length music documentary is about two Welsh brothers that launched the legendary Rockfield studios and brought rock and roll royalty such as Black Sabbath, Oasis, Coldplay, Stone Roses, Robert Plant and Simple Mind to their studio in the Monmouthshire countryside. It is produced by ie ie Productions’ Catryn Ramasut and also features Wales’ own James Dean Bradfield and Nicky Wire (Manic Street Preachers)
Joining Rockfield at SXSW is another film, Rare Beasts that featured in our latest Welsh Film Preview Days at Gwyn Hall in Neath & Galeri in Caernarfon and is the directorial debut of Billie Piper, who also plays Mandy, a modern woman in a crisis. Raising a son in the midst of a female revolution, mining the pain of her parents’ separation and professionally writing about a love that no longer exists, she falls upon a troubled man, Pete, who’s searching for a sense of worth, belonging and ‘restored’ male identity. Rare Beasts is produced by Vaughan Sivell (Western Edge Pictures) who is from Pembrokeshire.
Both films have received funding from Ffilm Cymru Wales.
FIRST LOOK IMAGE REVEALED
London, October 31, 2019 — Cornerstone Films has closed worldwide sales, including a multi-territory deal with Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions (SPWA), for BAFTA award-winning director Euros Lyn’s Dream Horse. The film stars Toni Collette and Damian Lewis together with Owen Teale, Joanna Page, Karl Johnson, with Nicholas Farrell and Siân Phillips. It is is currently in post production in Wales. Cornerstone Films has also closed deals with Welt Kino (Germany), Impuls (Switzerland), Hakuhodo DY music & pictures Inc. (Japan) and Terry Steiner (Airlines). As previously announced, Bleecker Street and Topic Studios have jointly acquired the U.S. rights and Warner Bros is distributing in the UK. The SPWA deal includes rest of world, excluding Canada, Italy and France.
Jan Vokes, a cleaner and bartender, recruits her initially reluctant husband Brian and local accountant Howard Davies to help her bring together a syndicate of local people to breed a foal – which they name Dream Alliance. On the racetrack, he proves himself to be more than a match for the multi-million pound racehorses he comes up against – a true working-class champion, taking on the establishment at their own game. But much more than this, Dream begins to alter the lives of everyone in the syndicate, not least Jan’s. He is everything to her: friend, confidant and an escape from a life of always putting other people’s needs first.
Dream Horse is a classic story of triumph against adversity, and a tale of how a woman strives to make her dream a reality in a place where hope is thin on the ground. The true story behind the film was previously told in the documentary Dark Horse, produced by Judith Dawson and directed by Louise Osmond, also backed by Film4 and Ffilm Cymru. It won the World Cinema Audience Award at
Sundance before being released by Picturehouse in the UK and Sony Pictures Classics in the U.S.
The RAW production was written by BAFTA award-winning writer Neil McKay and developed with Film4. It is produced by Katherine Butler and Tracy O’Riordan. Executive producers are Piers Vellacott and Joely Fether for RAW, Daniel Battsek and Ollie Madden for Film4, Peter Touche and Stephen Dailey for Ingenious Media, and Pauline Burt for Ffilm Cymru Wales.Film4, Ingenious Media, Ffilm Cymru Wales provided funding for the film, which is also supported by the Welsh Government. They are joined by Warner Bros UK, which will release the film in the UK. Cornerstone Films handled
international sales, and is selling Canada, Italy and France.
The UK Jewish Film Festival are screening the Welsh-Yiddish classic at 2 Welsh venues this December.
This Oscar-nominated classic is 20 years old this year. Set amid the anti-Jewish riots of 1911, and starring Ioan Gruffudd, Nia Roberts and Maureen Lipman, Solomon a Gaenor tells the story of a young Orthodox-Jewish man in South Wales who falls in love with a local girl. Will their love survive their respective communities’ prejudice and fear?
[an] understated, beautifully layered performance. – The New York Times
Find out how to book the film here.
For over a year The National Library of Wales (NLW) has been developing a scheme to offer bilingual resources from the Library’s graphic and audiovisual collections for reminiscence.
As part of the scheme, they are offering independent cinemas and film societies a programme of archival films that will appeal to older people, those living with dementia and their families; they will also offer a wider audience a medium to generate discussions about their community, e.g. how culture and traditions change over the years.
Find out more here
Ers dros flwyddyn mae Llyfrgell Genedlaethol Cymru (LlGC) wedi bod yn datblygu cynllun i gynnig adnoddau dwyieithog o gasgliadau gweledol a graffigol LlGC ar gyfer hel atgofion ac i hwyluso therapi’r cof.
Fel rhan o’r cynllun rydym yn cynnig rhaglen o ffilmiau archifol (sy’n addas ar gyfer pobl hŷn, rhai sy’n byw gyda dementia a’u teuluoedd) i sinemau annibynnol a chlybiau ffilm; bydd y ffilmiau hefyd yn cynnig cyfrwng i gynulleidfa ehangach i gychwyn sgyrsiau am y gymuned, e.e. sut mae diwylliant a thraddodiadau wedi newid dros y blynyddoedd.
Darganfod rhagor
The Equipment Hire Scheme is designed to help members who need to hire kit for pop up screenings.
Cinema For All has three sets of equipment one of which is hosted by Film Hub Wales, which are available to hire at low prices.
To help new groups get started the equipment pack is comprised of:
For more information about the scheme, click here.
If you’d like to book, fill out the booking form here.
This is an online space for Film Hub Wales members to connect with each other.
Hold conversations, announce events, provide information and ask questions. The more members and partnerships we build, the greater impact we can make for audiences and our exhibition sector in Wales.
