Outdoor cinema initiative to return for second year

Tuesday 26 March 2024

Walls around St Helier will be transformed into temporary cinema screens in May for one of the most innovative events in this year’s 13th Parish Film Festival.

Hamburg-based group 'A Wall is a Screen' are making a return visit to this year’s event – based at the Jersey Arts Centre from 23 to 26 May – offering islanders the chance to spend an evening at a cinema that moves around town with its audience.

Festival director Tony Langlois said that the festival demonstrated the huge potential of the Channel Islands for film and as a creative hub.

“For the size of the island, we are proud to have created a festival with such global reach and interest. Being part of an incredible international film circuit is something we can’t lose,” he said.

The 13th Parish Festival, which was launched five years ago, began with evenings of international shorts from the thought-provoking, to the funny and the thrilling, spanning a range of languages, themes, and cultural backgrounds.

But while work from festivals such as Venice and Sundance give the event a distinctly international feel, Mr Langlois added that the festival also has an important local focus, giving film-makers from Jersey the chance to make and showcase their own work.

Pictured: The team behind 'A Wall is a Screen' from Hamburg with Steve Carter from the 13th Parish Film Festival outside the former Odeon Cinema last year.

A programme of workshops, involving a partnership with the team at the Off-Courts festival in Trouville in Normandy’s Calvados Department, gives practitioners the chance to acquire new skills, while there is also the opportunity to direct and produce work in collaboration with others.

This year’s programme is in the process of being finalised but the success of last year’s virtual reality element – in which VR headsets allowed audiences to be transported to the highest peaks of Mount Everest in a climbing documentary – means that the technology will again return.

Mr Langlois added that they hoped they might be able to develop long-term partnerships with local organisations and businesses.

“As a charity, we are also happy to work with sponsors and partners whose CSR goals share our passion for keeping the arts alive and thriving on the island, giving the community experiences and films they may never be able to get otherwise.”

Further information about the festival is available at 13thparish.org.je, while organisations interested in sponsorship can contact Liana at liana@getrefined.com.

Pictured top: Hamburg-based group 'A Wall is a Screen' staged an event in West’s Centre during last year’s festival.