Caribbean Pop-Up Cinema's Caribbean International Film Fest
September 17th-29th
Birmingham, Bearwood and Coventry
The 2022 Pop-Up Cinema Caribbean International Film Fest has taken over various venues in Birmingham, Bearwood and Coventry to screen a diverse programme, rich in drama from a plethora of new cinematic voices, often children and maybe grandchildren of the Caribbean diaspora. The movies I’ve seen so far, on the opening day at the Mockingbird indie screen in Birmingham’s Custard Factory, were innervating, original, poignant and wildly entertaining.
Let’s just say that the opener, Jerk, indelibly written and directed by Raine Allen-Miller (website), grainily located in a lonely London flat and an archetypal community hub café, moved my co-watcher to tears. “That nearly broke me.” He said. Which also says so much about the incandescent power of the short story committed to film. Jerk you could watch over and over and always see more. We won’t soon forget Cedric Henderson’s performance, a dignified lifetime reduced in minutes, shorting the short order cooking.
Caribbean Pop-Up Cinema created the festival, they are renowned as a community cinema project which programmes Caribbean films, promotes Caribbean filmmakers, and produces Caribbean film events. Formed in 2019, they have taken movies out of conventional film theatres and into the community. Films to the people, allowing first and second generation Caribbean cinema lovers to enjoy some of the rich, authentic stories that are often hard to access elsewhere.
It’s hard to imagine this hasn’t happened before but the inaugural Caribbean International Film Festival runs from Saturday 17th – and has been extended until Thursday 29th September 2022 across the West Midlands.
Essential Information
Main image on this page Cedric Henderson in Jerk
Caribbean International Film Festival
Saturday 17th, 4-7pm, Mockingbird Cinema, Digbeth
Tuesday 20th, 5:30pm – 8pm, Belgrade Theatre, Coventry
Wednesday 21st, 5:30pm – 7:45pm, Mockingbird Cinema, Birmingham
Friday 23rd, 6pm – 8:30pm, Eastside Projects, Birmingham
Thursday 29th, 5:30 – 8pm, Bearwood Community Hub, Bearwood (rescheduled)
Caribbean International Film schedule webpage
Caribbean Pop up cinema website
