Welcome to the international Together! 2023 Disability Film Festival. The Festival will be viewable free from this page on 2 and 3 December 2023. Programmes will go live at 12 noon GMT each day and will be available for 24 hours. Booking information for our free afternoon Zoom events for filmmakers and audience members are available below. Details are coming soon, but Saturday’s programmes include Animation, Artists Films, Dance, Short Docs, Short Dramas, and a special programme to mark the Covid inquiries taking place in the UK and elsewhere. Sunday’s programmes include Artists Films, Dance, Short Docs, Short Dramas, and a special screening to mark International Day of Disabled People.
Saturday 2 December 3-4pm: Shadowlight Journeys Book here. Shadowlight Artists Wendy Belcher, Richard Hunt, Danny Smith & Tom Breach from Film Oxford return to the Together! 2023 Disability Film Festival with their new project, Journeys, currently on exhibition at Fire Station Oxford. Their films explore diverse themes, including creating an alternative artistic persona, living with grief and loss, the quest for artistic excellence, and the day-to-day challenges of life as an autistic adult. This is an opportunity to meet some of the artists, watch their films, and find out more about how they have developed as a film-making collective since they began in 2009. On Zoom with British Sign Language interpretation and live captions.
Sunday 3 December 3-4pm: Taking Stock: Disability Film on International Day of Disabled People. Book here. The international Together! 2023 Disability Film Festival received more than 1500 entries from around the world, the majority from non-disabled filmmakers. Many films portrayed disability as a tragedy or used other negative stereotyping, with happy endings apparently hard to imagine. Stories were often told through the eyes of non-disabled people, or non-disabled people were the subject of the film rather than the Disabled people they work with or care for. Taking Stock brings together audience members and filmmakers to discuss what needs to change? On Zoom with British Sign Language interpretation and live captions.
More about us: We screen films by Deaf/Disabled filmmakers, and films about Disability or with a strong central Deaf/Disabled character. Most of the films we screen will have been completed in the last 12-18 months, and many are premieres. Filmmakers do not need to identify as disabled themselves if Disabled people or Disability are the subject of the film; Deaf/Disabled filmmakers can submit work on any subject. Our priority is to provide a platform for strong storytelling, highlighting the lived experiences of Deaf/Disabled people from diverse backgrounds, and the talents of emerging and mid-career Deaf/Disabled filmmakers. Many of our films are world or international premieres, and go on to festivals worldwide.
We use our own ‘D’ rating system – one D each for a Deaf/Disabled (self-defined) person generating the film’s content, taking overall lead in making the film, and being the focus or star(s) of the film, working with or without support.
AWARDS We give Kat Awards for the best films These are named in honour of the late artist and filmmaker Katherine Araniello.
Follow this link for a history of Together! 2012 CIC’s annual international Disability Film Festival.
Supported by Arts Council England and Film London