Dear Future Film Festival at Electric Palace cinema

Join in with an extended weekend of looking ahead to the future with a selection of curated films, Q&As and special events at the Electric Palace cinema in Hastings Old Town, says Annie Waite.

The Electric Palace cinema in Hastings Old Town invites you to join the first Dear Future Film Festival coming up in Hastings, East Sussex, on 4- 7 November.

“We have been living in a year of deep uncertainty. We come together to discuss and share thoughts and ideas about you, our future, and to find some fun in these strange and disconcerting times. We have collected a selection of films and events for a small festival, as a way of thinking forward together,” say the curators of the festival, Rebecca E Marshall (director of Electric Palace) and Clare Whistler.

All films in the festival will include an introduction and Q&A with Rebecca and Clare, and there’s even a ‘Forest bathing’ external workshop at Powdermill Wood in Battle, with a short film screening included.

The Forest In Me

Hastings-based filmmaker Rebecca E Marshall will also present a rare opportunity to see her new film The Forest In Me, for which she ventured to the Russian wilderness to meet the elderly recluse, Agafya Lykova (pictured above), who lives alone in the Siberian Taiga.

“The only thing from the outside world that had really intruded into Agafya’s otherwise pristine forest was loads of fallen space junk amongst the trees,” says Rebecca.

Born in the Siberian forest in 1936, Agafya didn’t meet another person outside of her family until the age of 38. The last of her family died more than 30 years ago and since then she has chosen to remain in the forest on her own.

“I had so many questions for Agafya, and I managed with the support of a successful Indiegogo fundraising campaign to travel to meet and film with her in 2015,” says Rebecca.

You can see The Forest In Me on Saturday 6 November, as part of the Dear Future Film Festival.

Other films handpicked for the event are Agnès Varda’s The Gleaners and I, musician Laurie Anderson’s Heart of a Dog, and This Is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection, an extraordinary, intimate drama about an 80-year-old widow fighting development plans that will obliterate her village.

Films and events in the festival: 4-7 November

• The Gleaners and I (4 Nov): Agnès Varda’s touching and inspiring film was made over the course of a year using a hand-held digital camera as she seeks out scavengers across the French countryside.
• After Life (5 Nov): With humour and tenderness, filmmaker Koreeda challenges the viewer to reflect on the experiences that most make life worth living.
• To Go Back In Time To Dream Forward – woodland workshop (6 Nov): Go on a woodland meditation and indulge in some ‘forest bathing’ in the heart of the East Sussex countryside in this special workshop and short film screening. External Workshop, Powdermill Wood, 1.30pm to 4pm.
• The Forest in Me (6 Nov): A very special screening and talk with Rebecca E Marshall about her film focusing on elderly Siberian hermit, Agafya Lykova, and a warm meditation on time and space. Clare Whistler talks to Rebecca and invites questions from the audience in this special friends and family screening of her film.
• Heart of a Dog (7 Nov): Multimedia artist and musician Laurie Anderson’s beloved dog Lolabelle is remembered in this touching, cinematic personal essay.
• This Is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection (7 Nov): An extraordinary, intimate drama about an 80-year-old widow fighting development plans that will obliterate her village.

Book now on the Electric Palace website for all the events in the festival.

About Clare and Rebecca

Clare Whistler is a collaborative artist. She makes work in movement, site-specific work in the landscape, poetry and performance.

As eco poets kin’d & kin’d she works with Kay Syrad, runs Elephant Press with Raphael Whittle and co-runs WATERWEEK with Charlotte Still.

Rebecca E Marshall is a filmmaker and director of The Electric Palace. She is a PhD in Film by Practice and specialises in the 16th century humanist philosopher Michel de Montaigne and his driving principle of uncertainty.

Keep up to date with the cinema’s listings by signing up to get the Electric Palace enewsletter.

Also in: Film

« Electric Palace closed during January
Book to Film Club coming up at Electric Palace »