Poisoned Paradise (Pop-up Cinema Event)

In association with the Environmental Film Festival Planet On and its partner Connect4Climate, students from the MA International Film Business at the University of Exeter are in the final stages of organizing Poisoned Paradise, a pop-up cinema event featuring a diverse range of environmental documentary shorts that highlight the issues of pollution and waste around the world. 

 

The event is part of a course assignment, which challenges the students to explore new ways of exhibiting films and engaging with audiences. “We wanted to take on the challenge of redefining the environmental documentary film festival, making it an immersive and engaging experience for visitors who would normally be less inclined to attend a screening of environmental documentaries”, the students say. 

 

One of these students is Norma Cuadros, director of the Planet On environmental film festival in Colombia, who is doing the MA International Film Business program – which is run in collaboration with the London Film School – to gain knowledge and experience to elevate her festival to the next professional level. “Having Norma in our team has opened up possibilities of curating environmental documentary films that we otherwise would not have had access to”, says one of the team members. 

 

Poisoned Paradise has selected five short films from the Connect4Climate’s Film4Climate Global Competition 2016 that raise awareness about climate change, plastic pollution and waste. The films are from different countries such as Canada, Kiribati, Pakistan, United States and Israel.

 

The Pop Up Cinema event also will be screened The Sky Is Pink (2012) from American documentary filmmaker Josh Fox, who was nominated for an Academy Award in 2011 for his documentary feature GasLand (2010). While The Sky Is Pink addresses the detrimental effects of gas drilling in the state of New York, other topics that are dealt with in the Poisoned Paradise program vary from plastic pollution in oceans to issues of waste and social decay in Rio de Janeiro. 

 

“We want to engage people with environmental issues that go beyond climate change, issues they might not be aware of… and for us as film students there is no better way to do so than by passionately curating a selection of highly compelling documentary films.” 

 

 

Poisoned Paradise takes place at Exeter’s Bill Douglas Film Museum on Tuesday 12 December from 17h30 until 19h00. 

 

 

 

The following five shorts films are part of the Connect4Climate's Film4Climate Global Competition 2016: