Documentary – to exploit, or not to exploit, that is the question! - Screening + Q&A March 23, 2010

Documentary – to exploit, or not to exploit, that is the question! - Screening + Q&A
Tuesday 23 March 2010
6:30pm: Doors & Bar
7:00pm (PROMPT): Screening followed by Q&A/Debate
At: Lighthouse, 28 Kensington St, Brighton BN1 4AJ
Entry: FREE Spaces are Limited. To pre-book a place please contact Emma here: [email protected]

Come along to a special screening of ‘The Last American Freak Show’, as recently screened on More4 - a provocative and controversial feature length documentary made by director and cinematographer, Richard Butchins.
A film about disabled people who chose to be part of a Carnivalesque show that travels America.

Richard Butchins describes his work:

…. “I filmed the elephant man, the dwarf, a giant, a pair of lobster people, the half woman, a clown and a jumble of jug band musicians. On tour in a 20 year old school bus, travelling 2500 miles across America, the 'freaks' worked their way through the wild west. Laughing, crying and drinking – a carnival of the damned – searching for a home…"

…“Blair Witch meets Animal House”

…“This film is meant to make the watcher question their own concepts of disability and to cause debate …….. I make no apologies for the discomfort factor.”

Richard will introduce his film and contribute to a post-screening discussion that will explore various issues including:

• Exploitation - the blurry line between what is and isn’t acceptable?
• The profile of disabled filmmakers in both documentary and fictional narrative filmmaking today. Opportunities or tokenism?
• Representation – disability on screen.
• The documentary makers’ lot in the age of the jaded, the distrustful and the 'what's in it for me?" brigade.
More: http://www.lighthouse.org.uk/whatson/documentary.htm