The Gentle/Radical Film Club has been through several iterations, originally founded by Rabab Ghazoul in 2004 as the BME Women’s Film Club, the project later partnered WOW Festival in 2013 and renamed itself the WOW Women’s Film Club. In 2017, the Film Club found its permanent home under the umbrella of Gentle/Radical, a grassroots socially engaged arts organisation, working with culture, community renewal and social justice, and was reborn as the Gentle/Radical Film Club.
Over its 13 years, the Gentle/Radical Film Club has been delivering accessible, grassroots screenings to some of the most disenfranchised communities in South Wales, with a particular emphasis on BAME women, and the provision of bespoke, friendly screenings in which women can meet, watch and discuss films, in culturally sensitive environments. This means removing the barriers to so many women’s participation, from subsidised tickets – or free tickets – for asylum seeking women, through to providing free creche or transport for others.
The Film Club is the only cultural project in Wales that has sustained delivery of arts activities to minority ethnic communities continuously over a 13 year period. Whether working with mixed-gender diverse communities, young people of colour, or minority ethnic women, the hallmark of the project’s activities combine radical access with innovative programming, and a focus on genuine cultural integration.
Themes and subjects undertaken and explored through the Film Club’s screenings and grassroots film symposia range from adultism through to climate justice, systemic racism through to the connections across Indian Partition and the Palestinian Nakba.
