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Festival coverage

AV Festival

27 February – 27 March 2016

No Place For Fools
No Place For Fools

A biennial event, the festival is thematically curated and the editions of 2016 and 2018 take their inspiration from George Orwell's The Road To Wigan Pier. This year the festival will, according to director Rebecca Shatwell, present "work by artists and filmmakers who situate themselves in relation to historic and contemporary political struggle, revolution and social movements, creating new forms of resistance to neoliberal capitalism".

The festival will run from February 27 to March 27 at a range of venues across the north-east of England.

View complete schedule

Box office and information

Latest reviews

  • We Are The Lambeth Boys
    Review preview for We Are The Lambeth Boys

    There's a sense then that we're seeing more than the director intended.

    Jennie Kermode · 3.5 out of 5
    Follows a group of teenagers at work and in their leisure time, giving them space to express their frustrations and aspirations.
  • Refuge England
    Review preview for Refuge England

    Refuge England is a film made by someone with empathy for the man onscreen and genuine insight into the experience of leaving your home through necessity rather than choice.

    Rebecca Naughten · 3.5 out of 5
    The film records the experiences of a Hungarian refugee arriving in London with no English, little money and with his only prospect of help an incomplete address written on a postcard.
  • Revue
    Review preview for Revue

    Loznitsa does not impose his opinions onto the material in an obvious fashion.

    Rebecca Naughten · 3 out of 5
    Based on archive propaganda newsreels produced in the USSR in the 1950s and 60s.
  • Nightcleaners
    Review preview for Nightcleaners

    The Berwick Street Collective did not set out to make a by-the-numbers film and instead crafted a documentary that is experimental in form, and that strives to get at deeper truths about gender and labour inequalities.

    Rebecca Naughten · 4.5 out of 5
    A documentary about the campaign to unionise underpaid and victimised women who clean office blocks at night.
  • Utopias
    Review preview for Utopias

    To watch Utopias in 2016 is to experience a sense of déjà vu - it shows the NHS and whole concept of the welfare state under attack while the Labour Party flounders through factionalism and an inability to articulate a vision of the future.

    Rebecca Naughten · 4 out of 5
    A series of individuals explain what socialism means to them.
  • A Dream From The Bath
    Review preview for A Dream From The Bath

    A thought-provoking 22 minutes.

    Rebecca Naughten · 3.5 out of 5
    Response to the 1985 Films Act.
  • Words For Battle
    Review preview for Words For Battle

    The film lacks the lively spark and sense of nationwide collectivism of Jennings' subsequent film, Listen to Britain.

    Rebecca Naughten · 3 out of 5
    Poetry and excerpts considering conflict.
  • Listen To Britain
    Review preview for Listen To Britain

    A poetic evocation of Britain under pressure.

    Rebecca Naughten · 4 out of 5
    A symphony of sounds in a day in the life of Britain during wartime.
  • The Silent Village
    Review preview for The Silent Village

    The film suggests that the story ignites a sense of working class solidarity.

    Rebecca Naughten · 3.5 out of 5
    The true story of the massacre of a small Czech village by the Nazis is retold as if it happened in Wales.
  • Spare Time
    Review preview for Spare Time

    Jennings had an eye for small moments that signal real life rather than something staged for the camera

    Rebecca Naughten · 3.5 out of 5
    A look at how industry workers spend their off-hours.

A–Z of AV Festival 2016 reviews

Features