Cultural Dessert

‘Luminate Short Encounters’

27 October 2017

On Wednesday afternoon I was at the WHALE Community Cinema in WHALE Arts Centre, Wester Hailes, Edinburgh, to watch ‘Luminate Short Encounters’ – a series of seven short documentary films dealing with various aspects of ageing. These included one of the excellent 'Directed by North Merchiston' films by Duncan Cowles that were commissioned by Luminate in 2016. Each of the seven films were fascinating in very different ways. I particularly enjoyed ‘Bacon and God’s Wrath’ – a Canadian film by Sol Friedman which shows how a 90-year old Jewish woman, Razie Brownstone, having reached a new chapter in her life, begins to question her religion and decides to take the significant step to eat bacon for the first time. And I was gripped by ‘Nae Pasaran’ – a film by Chilean director Felipe Bustos Sierra which reunites three of the Scottish factory workers who, in 1974, refused to carry out repairs on war planes used in the violent military coup in Chile in an expression of solidarity with the Chilean people. ‘Luminate Short Encounters’ was a surprising and thought-provoking collection of short films and, in common with all the Luminate Festival events I have visited this week, was presented by WHALE Arts with a very warm, friendly welcome and copious amounts of free refreshments.

Labels: Film, Luminate2017

posted by Robin Simpson @ 2:11 pm