Writer and editor Laura Staab, Yaya Azariah Clarke and film scholar Giulia Rho discuss the revolutionary film movement that emerged from the UCLA Film School in the early 1970s, the so-called ‘L.A. Rebellion’ which was a powerful and transformative chapter in the history of American cinema. A significant cultural and artistic response to the turbulent sociopolitical climate of the time, the films challenged prevailing norms of Black representation, forging a new African American cinematic language.

This programme of shorts brought together short films by three ‘insurgent sisters’ of the LA Rebellion: Illusions (1982), an early short by Julie Dash (who would go on to make the acclaimed feature Daughters of the Dust); Cycles (1989) by Zeinabu irene Davis; and A Different Image (1982) by Alile Sharon Larkin. Offering a specifically ‘womanist’ sensibility, these films resist the images of Black womenhood produced by Hollywood and independent film of the time, reclaiming Black female subjectivity through poetic and playful cinematic reconstructions of time, space and the body.

As part of our season Trailblazers: Women in New Hollywood, curated by Dr Alice Pember

Recorded on 1st December at The Garden Cinema