Friday 4 April 2014

Tolpuddle Radical Film Festival

Hello Editor,
I contacted you recently asking for support for the Tolpuddle Radical Film Festival in July. We have done pretty well so far, raising over £1,000 from trade union branches and University supporters but we need more in order to hire the vintage cinema bus and put this festival on.
We are now seeking smaller individual contributions throughSponsume to ensure this is a truly collectively owned event. Could you please forward this email on to your members and contacts lists.
Many Thanks,
Reuben
 
TheTolpuddle Radical Film Festival will be free at the point of use; no one has to pay to see these films. But the festival still has to be paid for. We have raised half the money already from Trades Councils, Union Branches and other organisations but we want the ownership of this event to be as broad as possible so we have now launched a crowd funding campaign. All contributions will help so whether you want to bung us a quid, or treat someone to a special seat, your support will be hugely welcome.
http://www.sponsume.com/project/tolpuddle-radical-film-festival
More About The Festival
The main Tolpuddle Festival will run from Friday 18 July 2014 - Sunday 20 July 2014. We will run alongside this festival and be included in their publicity (brochures, website etc). We are currently negotiating to launch the festival with a pre-release screening of Still The Enemy Within and will be theming the festival on mining and Trade Unionism in honour of the 30th anniversary of the 1984 Miners strike. We will also be running a short film competition ‘Small Axe’ to encourage and promote new radical political filmmaking.
Ken Loach is supporting the festival and may come to speak: “I strongly support the idea of a Radical Film Festival at Tolpuddle. Films can bring in new ideas, new perspectives, new voices. As trade unionists we urgently need to re-examine our attitude to the existing parties. We need real political representation and to re-discover our militancy. Films that reflect struggles of working people can be a spur to action”Ken Loach
All the management and organisation of the festival is being done voluntarily. We will be screening films in the Vintage Mobile Cinema. To do this we need to raise £2500. If we can raise more this will allow us to invite more speakers (paying their expenses) and promote the event more widely. We also hope to raise money to provide a prize for the Small Axe competition.

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