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Films
& Documentaries...
Reading is not for everyone. There are many different formats to access information, and educate yourself about the world, least of which is film. This is a long-standing medium which has educated peoples around the world about their own oppression, and radicalised them into action.
We've made a list of films listed below which we think are worth watching. We've selected films which will appeal to a range of audiences and in their own way inspire our own work. Some of the videos are behind paywalls, others are free-to-view. All of them come highly recommended by PEN Scotland activists.
You can make your own recommendations by getting in touch with us!
To See Ourselves
The 2014 referendum on Scottish independence sparked a revival of political debate in streets and homes across the country. When a pregnant film maker picked up her camera to follow her idealistic father's activism she thought she was capturing the re-birth of a nation. What she captured instead is an unflinching portrait of a man relentless in faith, a family struggling with obsession and a nation gripped by hope and fear. This poetic, deeply moving film is the untold story of the heart behind the politics during this historic crossroads for Scotland.
(Directed by Jane McAllister, 2023)
You've Been Trumped Too
Investigative journalist Anthony Baxter travels between the Presidential race and the timeless Scottish countryside to explore the troubling confrontation between a feisty 92-year-old Scottish widow and her family and Donald Trump. As Trump campaigns for President, Molly struggles to find enough water to wash up, feed her chickens, or even flush the toilet.
(Directed by Anthony Baxter, 2020)
Decade of Fire: The South Bronx is Burning
Throughout the 1970’s, fires consumed the South Bronx. Black and Puerto Rican residents were blamed for the devastation even as they battled daily to save their neighborhoods. In DECADE OF FIRE, Bronx-born Vivian Vázquez Irizarry pursues the truth surrounding the fires – uncovering policies of racism and neglect that still shape our cities, and offering hope to communities on the brink today.
(Directed by Gretchen Hildebran, Vivian Vazquez, 2019)
American Revolutionary: The Evolution of Grace Lee Boggs
This film plunges us into Boggs’s lifetime of vital thinking and action, traversing the major U.S. social movements of the last century: from labour to civil rights, to Black Power, feminism, the Asian American and environmental justice movements and beyond. Boggs’s constantly evolving strategy – her willingness to re-evaluate and change tactics in relation to the world shifting around her – drives the story forward.
(Directed by Grace Lee, 2013)
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