Hastings' first Palestinian Film Festival. May 2019
Hastings and Rye Palestine Solidarity Campaign (HRPSC) has teamed up with The Electric Palace cinema and The Printworks to showcase three films to mark Nakba Day.
The Nakba, the Arabic word for catastrophe, is used to describe the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in 1946/9 by Israeli forces. During this period, over 750,000 Palestinians were driven from their homes and about 550 villages were destroyed or occupied.
May 10. Naila and the Uprising. The Electric Palace.
May 11. Speed Sisters. The Electric Palace.
May 23. The Wanted 18. The Printworks
Electric Palace Cinema. Friday 10 May. 8pm.
When a nation-wide uprising breaks out in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, a young woman in Gaza must make a choice between love, family, and freedom. Undaunted, she embraces all three, joining a clandestine network of women in a movement that forces the world to recognize the Palestinian right to self-determination for the first time. Naila and the Uprising chronicles the remarkable journey of Naila Ayesh and a fierce community of women at the frontlines, whose stories weave through the most vibrant, nonviolent mobilization in Palestinian history - the First Intifada in the late 1980s.
Using evocative animation, intimate interviews, and exclusive archival footage, this film brings out of anonymity the courageous women activists who have remained on the margins of history - until now. While most images of the First Intifada paint an incomplete picture of stone-throwing young men front and centre, this film tells the story that history overlooked - of an unbending, nonviolent women's movement at the head of Palestine's struggle for freedom.
Directed by Julia Bracha [Unrated] Length: 76 mins. Trailer.
Admission £8 (Concessions £7). Buy tickets. Electric Palace Cinema, 39a High Street, Hastings TN34 3ER .
Electric Palace Cinema. Saturday 11 May. 8pm.
The Speed Sisters are the first all-woman race car driving team in the Middle East. Grabbing headlines and turning heads at improvised tracks across the West Bank, these five women have sped their way into the heart of the gritty, male-dominated Palestinian street car-racing scene.
Despite a tangle of roadblocks and checkpoints, a thriving street car racing scene has emerged in the West Bank. Held at improvised tracks - a vegetable market, an old helicopter pad, a security academy - the races offer a release from the pressures and uncertainties of life under military occupation. The fanfare and rivalry between cities brings spectators out in droves, lining rooftops and leaning over barricades to snap photos of their favorite drivers and to catch final times on the scoreboard. Weaving together their lives on and off the track, Speed Sisters takes you on a surprising journey into the drive to go further and faster than anyone thought you could.
Directed by Amber Fares [PG]. Length: 78 mins. Trailer.
Admission £8 (Concessions £7). Buy tickets. Electric Palace Cinema, 39a High Street, Hastings TN34 3ER.
The Printworks. Thursday 23 May. 7.30 pm.
The Wanted 18 tells the true story about Beit Sahour, a small Palestinian town outside of Bethlehem, which buys 18 cows during the First Intifada as part of a drive for self-sufficiency. The townspeople teach themselves how to care for and milk the animals and the farm is a success, with strong local demand for "Intifada milk." However, the herd is declared a 'threat to the national security of the state of Israel' and Israeli forces seek to impound them, forcing the town to hide the herd as fugitives from the law. This ridiculous and yet important story of resistance is told with humour through archival footage, reconstruction, interviews, and stop motion animation.
The Wanted 18's director Amer Shomali grew up in a Palestinian refugee camp in Syria. He spent his days reading comic books and learning about the incredible stories of the uprising in Beit Sahour, where his father and many of his close relatives came from. He describes making the film as a 'window into the past', adding: 'It was a healing process for me to recreate this reality I'd missed.'
Directed by Amer Shomali [Unrated]. Length: 75 mins. Trailer.
Free admission (Donation requested). The Printworks, 14 Claremont, America Ground, Hastings TN34 1HA.
The Nakba, the Arabic word for catastrophe, is used to describe the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in 1946/9 by Israeli forces. During this period, over 750,000 Palestinians were driven from their homes and about 550 villages were destroyed or occupied.
May 10. Naila and the Uprising. The Electric Palace.
May 11. Speed Sisters. The Electric Palace.
May 23. The Wanted 18. The Printworks
Naila and the Uprising.
"Thoughtful, moving, immensely valuable re-telling of the First Palestinian Intifada."
Electric Palace Cinema. Friday 10 May. 8pm.
When a nation-wide uprising breaks out in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, a young woman in Gaza must make a choice between love, family, and freedom. Undaunted, she embraces all three, joining a clandestine network of women in a movement that forces the world to recognize the Palestinian right to self-determination for the first time. Naila and the Uprising chronicles the remarkable journey of Naila Ayesh and a fierce community of women at the frontlines, whose stories weave through the most vibrant, nonviolent mobilization in Palestinian history - the First Intifada in the late 1980s.
Using evocative animation, intimate interviews, and exclusive archival footage, this film brings out of anonymity the courageous women activists who have remained on the margins of history - until now. While most images of the First Intifada paint an incomplete picture of stone-throwing young men front and centre, this film tells the story that history overlooked - of an unbending, nonviolent women's movement at the head of Palestine's struggle for freedom.
Directed by Julia Bracha [Unrated] Length: 76 mins. Trailer.
Admission £8 (Concessions £7). Buy tickets. Electric Palace Cinema, 39a High Street, Hastings TN34 3ER .
Speed Sisters.
"An eye-opening documentary that succeeds in its goal of shattering stereotypes."
Electric Palace Cinema. Saturday 11 May. 8pm.
The Speed Sisters are the first all-woman race car driving team in the Middle East. Grabbing headlines and turning heads at improvised tracks across the West Bank, these five women have sped their way into the heart of the gritty, male-dominated Palestinian street car-racing scene.
Despite a tangle of roadblocks and checkpoints, a thriving street car racing scene has emerged in the West Bank. Held at improvised tracks - a vegetable market, an old helicopter pad, a security academy - the races offer a release from the pressures and uncertainties of life under military occupation. The fanfare and rivalry between cities brings spectators out in droves, lining rooftops and leaning over barricades to snap photos of their favorite drivers and to catch final times on the scoreboard. Weaving together their lives on and off the track, Speed Sisters takes you on a surprising journey into the drive to go further and faster than anyone thought you could.
Directed by Amber Fares [PG]. Length: 78 mins. Trailer.
Admission £8 (Concessions £7). Buy tickets. Electric Palace Cinema, 39a High Street, Hastings TN34 3ER.
The Wanted 18.
"An essential film illustrating the non-violent resistance of my Palestinian friends in the face of Israeli apartheid policies and practices - and humorous!"
The Printworks. Thursday 23 May. 7.30 pm.
The Wanted 18 tells the true story about Beit Sahour, a small Palestinian town outside of Bethlehem, which buys 18 cows during the First Intifada as part of a drive for self-sufficiency. The townspeople teach themselves how to care for and milk the animals and the farm is a success, with strong local demand for "Intifada milk." However, the herd is declared a 'threat to the national security of the state of Israel' and Israeli forces seek to impound them, forcing the town to hide the herd as fugitives from the law. This ridiculous and yet important story of resistance is told with humour through archival footage, reconstruction, interviews, and stop motion animation.
The Wanted 18's director Amer Shomali grew up in a Palestinian refugee camp in Syria. He spent his days reading comic books and learning about the incredible stories of the uprising in Beit Sahour, where his father and many of his close relatives came from. He describes making the film as a 'window into the past', adding: 'It was a healing process for me to recreate this reality I'd missed.'
Directed by Amer Shomali [Unrated]. Length: 75 mins. Trailer.
Free admission (Donation requested). The Printworks, 14 Claremont, America Ground, Hastings TN34 1HA.
