Join film-makers, experts and translators to discuss world cinema and take part in free screenings

University of Exeter MA students have provided new translations to feature films, which will be shown followed by a roundtable discussion between them and film-makers, academics, translators and film restorers.

The event will take place online on Saturday November 21, from 9:30 am - 6:30 pm and is part of the Being Human Festival of the Humanities.

The films come from three continents, Africa, Asia and Europe, and span four languages, Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), Italian and Spanish, and range from the 1960s to the present day.

Professor Sally Faulkner, from the University of Exeter, who is organising the event said: “We are looking forward to welcoming people to watch these two documentaries and two feature films. They all share a focus on gender, from an early example of Spanish feminist cinema, to a Moroccan 1980s classic, a Chinese LGBT documentary, and a recent documentary about Italian second-wave feminists.

“We hope as many people as possible will join us for what promises to be a fascinating discussion after watching the films.”

The first film is Life Goes On, from 1963, directed by Fernán Gómez, which is Spanish with English subtitled and features the story of two warring sisters struggling to survive in the repressive context of dictatorship Spain.

The second film is A Door to the Sky, from 1985, directed by Benlyazid, in Arabic with English subtitles. It features the story of Nadia, a young Moroccan emigre, who returns from Paris to Fez to visit her dying father and later turns his palace into a Muslim women's shelter.

The third film is Shanghai Queer from 2019, directed by Xiangqi, in Mandarin with English subtitles, a documentary about the pursuit of the LGBT community in China for freedom and equality.

The fourth film is Melmaridè from 2019, directed by Bozzarelli and Daneluzzo, in Italian with English subtitles. This tells the story of 40 years of friendship between a group of women from Piacenza, a small city in the north of Italy, who found a Feminist Collective and a public women’s health clinic and counselling centre that offered information on birth control, medical examinations, and help on how to get an abortion at the time when abortion was still illegal in Italy.

To register go to https://beinghumanfestival.org/event/subtitling-world-cinema-workshop/ or email research-events@exeter.ac.uk