Cine-City: Brighton Film Festival

The UK has a whole host of brilliant film festivals from Bird’s Eye View in London to Viva! in Manchester.
One of my favourites is Brighton’s annual Cine City. Held every November, Cine City aims to develop film culture in the South East and offer audiences access to films they might not get to see on the big screen otherwise. As well as previews and premieres of new and magical films from Europe, South America, Japan, Thailand, Korea, Brazil, America and the Middle East, there are directors talks, Q&A sessions with producers and cast members and exclusive shorts.
Last year’s festival included screenings of John Hillcoat’s The Road, Jim Jarmusch’s The Limits of Control and Jacques Audierd’s A Prophet alongside lesser known gems like Yorgos Lanthimos’s Dogtooth and Gerardo Naranjo’s I’m Gonna Explode.
In short, Cine City = Essential viewing.

Cine-​City, is the type of festival, which makes living in Brighton pretty damn good.
This year sadly I have only been able to catch one of the screenings, but I was not dissapointed. The film was called Ajami, and the viewing I saw was its première in England, so although the red carpet and photographers hadn’t been present, I still felt very lucky. Basically I don’t want to ruin the film, which I believe will be released in the U.K. quite soon, but it is a City of God-​esque depiction of the cycle of violence that takes place in a small, mainly Palestinian area, within the Israeli border. It’s pretty grim, it’s pretty depressing and it’s incredibly bleak, but it’s done well because the violence is not glorified in any way, and it makes you think about the problems which underly it.
Films like this, made by independent production companies, from countries which U.K. audiences would usually never see, and involving a cast of locals and amateurs, is what Cine-​City is all about. Long may it continue.

Cine-​city is the South Coast’s foremost film festival, and is put on as a collaboration between Brighton University, the Duke of York cinema and film agency, Cinecity. The festival is based in cinemas and arts spaces throughout the Brighton and Hove area and runs for a few weeks in November and December.
Every year I tell myself I will make more of an effort to go to screenings, and every year I’m lucky if I manage one or two! Everything I’ve seen as a part of Cine-​city has been really interesting and I would highly recommend checking at least one film out if you can! The festival is an impressive mix of previews, premieres and golden oldies that you will rarely get a chance to see on the big screen. Cine-​city selects the finest of the year’s international cinema and offers up a tantalising programme of new, old, indie and even mainstream films. The majority of the films are little-​known to the average person and it can be a great opportunity to discover a wonderfully obscure movie or an emerging filmmaker. The festival is also a great change to catch one-​off events such as director Q&As or moving image art exhibitions.
Whether you’re a film-​buff or not, this is a great festival, well worth investigating!