Mark Cousins’ A Story of Children & Film, and the accompanying BFI-supported Cinema of Childhood season was the catalyst for Watch Talk Think evolving from an informal film club to these public events.
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A Story of Children & Film at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health Annual Conference with Adam Dawtrey, producer.
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The White Balloon (Panahi 1995) at The Foundling Museum
Panahi’s Camera D’Or-winning masterpiece follows the adventures of a little girl who wants a new goldfish to celebrate Iranian New Year, and won’t take no for an answer.
The director has been banned from making films for 20 years by the Iranian government for “propaganda against the state”
Panellists included:
Michèle Bartlett: Integrative Arts and Child Psychotherapist, Chair UK Council for Psychotherapy – Faculty for the Psychological Health of Children
Maghsood Salehi: Broadcast Journalist/Producer for BBC World Service and Middle East Film critic
Saeed Zeydabadi-Nejad: Senior Teaching Fellow, SOAS and author of “The Politics of Iranian Cinema: Films and Society in the Islamic Republic”
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Crows (Kedzierzawska, 1994) at The Foundling Museum
A 9-year-old girl is neglected at home, laughed at in school, and furious with the world. So she steals a cute little toddler to become her surrogate mother. They run away to the sea, but soon discover just how hard being a parent really is…
Panellists included:
Michael Brooke – writer on Polish cinema including for Sight & Sound and DVD booklet essays for Arrow Academy and Second Run.
Professor June Thoburn CBE – Professor of Social Work, University of East Anglia; Children & Families Faculty, The College of Social Work
Cathy Troupp – Child & Adolescent Psychotherapist, Great Ormond Street Hospital and Anna Freud Centre.
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Willow and Wind (Talebi, 1999) at The Foundling Museum
“A boy’s quest to repair the school window he broke with a football is a trance-like wonder that beautifully conveys the vulnerability of childhood.” Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
Followed by a panel discussion with:
Professor Margaret O’Brien, Director, Thomas Coram Research Unit, Institute of Education
Caro Howell, Director, The Foundling Museum
Saeed Zeydabadi-Nejad: Senior Teaching Fellow, SOAS and author of “The Politics of Iranian Cinema: Films and Society in the Islamic Republic”
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King of Masks (Wu, 1996) at the Genesis Cinema in Mile End
An old illusionist in China needs an heir to pass on the secret of his mask tricks – so he buys himself a grandson from a needy peasant. But the child is hiding a secret. When the magician finds out, there’s hell to pay, and only spectacular action can save the day. Swooping emotional drama about a kid who wants to be loved, and an old man who learns how to open his heart.
Speakers included:
- BAFTA-winning director Jezza Neumann (China’s Stolen Children),
- TV anthropologist Mary Ann Ochota (Unreported World) and
- Dr. Peggy Froerer (Childhood Anthropologist, Brunel University).
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The Unseen (Janek, 1996)
At a school for the blind in the Czech Republic, the children exuberantly show off their remarkable talents – as musicians, as radio announcers, as daredevil bike riders and, most extraordinary of all, as photographers. Why take pictures of a world you can’t see?
Panellists included:
Dr. Louise Fryer, BBC Radio 3, PhD – impact of visual impairment on perception, Audio describer
Prof. Judith Harwin, Director of Centre for Child & Youth Research, Brunel University
Dr. Jenefer Sargent, Consultant Paediatrician, Developmental Vision Clinic, Great Ormond Street Hospital
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The Little Girl Who Sold The Sun (Mambéty, 1999)
Sili, a feisty disabled girl, decides to do a boy’s job, selling newspapers on the streets of Dakar. She’s great at it, but the boys aren’t happy. Sili doesn’t care and dances in a dress the colour of sunflowers. This little film is a big-hearted odyssey about daring to imagine what you can be and to hell with what anyone else thinks.
Panel Discussion and Q&A will touch on global health, childhood disability, and using film to foster interdisciplinary debate.
Speakers included:
- Professor Sir Eldryd Parry (Founder, Tropical Health Education Trust)
- Professor Nora Groce (Leonard Cheshire Chair in Disability & Inclusive Development, UCL)
- Ola Abu Al Ghaib (Disability Rights & Advocacy Coordinator, Handicap International)
- Kunle Olulode (British Film Institute’s African Odyssey Programming Group)
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Long Live The Republic (Kachyna, 1965)
Watch Talk Think 