After opening last year's Belfast Film Festival and screening in the BFI London Film Festival and other international film festivals, ‘I am Belfast’ will be released by the BFI in selected cinemas and on BFI Player from 8 April 2016, followed by a DVD/Blu-ray release on 20 June.
This release will be boosted by a programme of screenings and special events across Belfast and inspiring people across the UK through a special I Am… programme, designed to creatively engage people in all things magical about their home cities.
Made possible by Film Hub NI with support from the BFI's Lottery funded Programme Development Fund, screenings of ‘I Am Belfast’ will be supported by special events hosted by QFT (Belfast), BFI Southbank (London), Home (Manchester), Tyneside Cinema (Newcastle), Filmhouse (Edinburgh), Watershed (Bristol) and a special Hull-based screening.
From the 8th April, the QFT offers an enhanced programme of films inspired by Mark Cousins’ and Christopher Doyle’s celebration of colour in film. The programme of events will also offer people an opportunity to experience the city in a unique way, when Film Hub NI, QFT and the Black Box, invite the audiences of Belfast to go on a Sunday walk, inspired by locations in the film, on 10th April.
Speaking about the events, Susan Picken, Head of QFT, said: “I Am Belfast’ is a uniquely personal portrait of our city by one of our leading film talents. It perfectly captures Belfast’s beauty, humour and warmth as well as evoking the tensions and traumas of the city’s past. It offers a new way of looking at and thinking about the cities in which we live and in finding moments of magic in the midst of the everyday. We are delighted that Mark has allowed us to use his film as the inspiration for this truly exciting programme of events”.
The acclaimed documentary, described by The Hollywood Reporter as “a charmingly offbeat tribute to a big-hearted city” sees Mark Cousins go back to Belfast where he meets a woman who claims to be city itself; she says she is 10,000 years old. Old and wise, serene and graceful, the woman, played by Helena Bereen (‘Hunger’, ‘Mo’) guides the unseen director around the streets on an emotional journey through the rich, complex and often tragic history of Northern Ireland's capital.
DoP on the film was Christopher Doyle, with his cinematography mixing in with archival clips from peacetime and times of violent conflict, while composer David Holmes provided the score.
Alongside the QFT programme, Takeover Film will see the young people of the city create their own city film in response to ‘I Am Belfast’, Second Chance Cinema will showcase other short films inspired by the city of Belfast including work by local filmmakers and artists such as Seamus Harahan and Glass Eye Cine at the Maple Leaf Club in East Belfast will host screenings of films that inspired Mark in the making of ‘I Am Belfast’.
Mark Cousins will present ‘I Am Belfast’ and be in interview at:
7th April - BFI Southbank, London
8th April – HOME, Manchester
10th April – QFT, Belfast
11th April – Filmhouse, Edinburgh
12th April – Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle
The film will also screen at the Irish Film Institute on April 20th.
For more details on the season of events please visit www.filmhubni.org.
‘I Am Belfast’ hits UK and Irish cinemas on April 8th - check out the trailer below:
