This October, to mark Black History Month, the 75th anniversary of the arrival of the Empire Windrush in the UK, and following from our recent Francophone West African season, we’re filling our regular Musical Friday slots with music inspired films, documentaries, and musicals that explore Caribbean culture and history.
Our mini-season begins on these shores with an extremely rare cinema screening of Steve McQueen’s magnificent and joyful Lovers Rock (2020) on 6 October – introduced by the film’s co-writer, playwright and novelist, Courttia Newland. . This screening is free and included in the ticket for our Garden Cinema house party. Our very own Blues Party is in partnership with Lin Kam Art and will see contemporary sets from the next generation of British DJ talent as well as Linett Kamala herself spinning lover’s rock and classic dub from a vintage soundsystem provided by Audio Gold in our bar – stocked with Red Stripe, Guinness, rum, and maybe even a Cherry B… A selection of short films and archive material curated by Theatrum Mundi will play in both screens during our late evening sets.
Tickets for the party are £14 (members) and £16 (non-members).
The UK’s leading black music expert and author Lloyd Bradley (Sounds Like London, Bass Culture) will be on hand on 13 October to introduce a screening of the enduring Jamaican classic, The Harder They Come (1972), fresh from 50th anniversary screenings last year, and the centrepiece of Lloyd’s ‘From Jamaica to the World: Reggae on Film’ season for the BFI in 2022.
Described by bfi.org as ‘the African musical masterpiece you’ve never seen’ (and featuring in the recent Sight and Sound greatest films of all-time list), Med Hondo’s West Indies (1979) is a wholly unique and utterly astonishing Brechtian depiction and critique of colonial rule in the French West Indies. This UK premiere of a new digital restoration on 20 October will be followed by a panel discussion chaired by Theatrum Mundi co-director, curator, and poet, Labeja Kodua, and featuring Dr Sarah Jilani (City, University of London). The full list of panellists will be announced shortly.
The journey concludes on 27 October with the recent restoration and rediscovery of Kavery Kaul’s essential, nostalgic, and infectious document of the 1986 Trinidad and Tobago carnival, told through Calypso legends Lord Kitchener and Calypso Rose, One Hand Don’t Clap (1991). We’ll be pumping Soca and Calypso in the bar and serving up Dr Gee’s notorious rum punch all evening. Kavery Kaul herself will beam in via technology for a post screening Q&A/carnival memory sharing session.
Our line-up of screenings + events is as follows:
6 October: Lovers Rock (Steve McQueen, 2020) + Garden Cinema house party
13 October: The Harder They Come (Perry Henzell, 1972) + introduction from Lloyd Bradley
20 October: West Indies (Med Hondo, 1979) + panel discussion
27 October: One Hand Don’t Clap (Kavery Kaul, 1991) + director Q&A + Soca takeover
We understand that cinema prices can be prohibitive to many during a cost of living crisis, and that West End venues might be seen as exclusory spaces for some. We are thus working with our partners, Lin Kam Art, Redeye, and the Black Cultural Archive’s Youth Forum to provide free tickets to all events in this season to Caribbean heritage audiences in London who might not otherwise be able to afford, or feel comfortable, attending.
