Gazing at the World Through Cinema

words by: TABITHA JUKES design by: ELAINE TANG

Everything about cinema has always fascinated me. Remembering back to my first cinematic experience, I was watching Space Jam with my single mum, who slept and snored through the entire film after working a long night shift. Even today, she pretends she watched every second and loved it. Not that I minded, I was way too absorbed in the immersive world of outer space, Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny. My ten-year-old brain was exploding, it was a new world after all. Later memories come in the form of early teen nostalgia: unsupervised cinema trips where my independence will remain rooted forever. Buying my own overpriced popcorn, ice blasts and sneaking pick n’ mix with friends. Those ‘cinema-date’ days, and that big screen was my first taste of youth and freedom.

As an older admirer and my post fifteen-year-old self Woody Allen discovery, I appreciate the more artistic (and pretentious) elements of enjoying film. How cinematography, sound and movement merge to create powerful storytelling, aesthetics and soundtracks. The marriage of well-made films will never fail to amaze me. The psychology of film and how its success arose with the increased human need for escape, sounds familiar, right? But equally important, is how film-watching provides a vehicle to connect us.

As a physical space, the role of the cinema has a history in making spaces for communities that lack equal inclusion or representation. The rise of the cinema came from the demand of working-class communities needing affordable activities. Later in the 1970s the post-civil rights era saw the Black Power cinema gain better accreditation for marginalised groups, including Queer Cinema making waves into the mainstream. Paris is Burning is a powerful example of tense American racial structures in the 1980s, revealing how ballroom and club culture enabled the most marginalised individuals (non-normative sexualities, people of colour and low income groups in New York) to not only reclaim their identities, but to celebrate it with vibrancy and noise. On the UK side, Shaun Meadows’ This is England offers a lens into the rich subcultures of Northern working-class communities. It explores the 1980s waves of English nationalism, white skinhead culture and how it came to appropriate the influential multiculturalism of 1960s West Indies culture inspired by ska, soul and reggae movements.

Whilst contemporary cinema is slowly improving its spaces for BAME producers, directors and actors with 2020 seeing a significant stamp of talent making the mainstream – think Rafiki, Queen and Slim and Parasite. On a local level film clubs and social activist groups continue to use the body of cinema to encourage unity. The Cardiff based Refugee NGO’S Oasis and STAR have organised screenings of films depicting the humanitarian migrant crisis of which many are available online, see Channel 4’s For Sama and Ai Weiwei’s incredible Human Flow showing the turbulent journeys migrants travel to fin search for safety.

As cinema works to better visualise diversity and culture, we must understand that cinema today often comes with privilege in both time or money, it is not always the most accessible or practical way for people to experience film depending on income, comfortability and time. So, we should ask ourselves – especially in turbulent times of physical and social disconnect – what exactly is cinema in our society today, and what does it mean to us? How has it changed as we have changed? I mainly wonder if film can be a personal telescope to the wider worlds and people around us if it’s used with consciousness and care.

Streaming sites like heavyweights Prime Video, Netflix, Channel 4 and iPlayer (check out iPlayer’s wonderful STORYVILLE, a series curated of international documentaries) are all affordable, especially if you’re like me and share a friend or relatives account which are expedient cult forms of film watching from your home. The Netflix Party movement, whereby this new feature provides users with a form of tangible connection and entertainment, has been hailed as a small hero amidst the global Covid-19 outbreak. Here you can link films, share the screening and write comments. Such simple normalities like watching a film with loved ones, who are distant, can be a meaningful experience and remind us of our closeness in a time of necessary separation. Additionally, MUBI, a personal favourite, are offering a 3 month subscription for just £1 in light of the pandemic. Their hand-picked selection of films range from cult classics, indie picks and ethnographic films which showcase various cultures in ways we often dream to imagine.

The diverse range of documentary and film provided on these sites give us instant access to cultural and global representations that teach us, moves us, and provide us with growth as individuals and communities. For me, film is my way of travelling, exploring and navigating much of this ever-growing and diverse world. As a storyteller, I think film and the experience of watching films is something I will be eternally grateful for and passionate about. Cinema is our way of gazing at the world, and the many humans I share it with. Used wisely, it’s an immeasurable gift.