Edinburgh’s Folk Film Gathering has announced its 10th anniversary programme, which features a host of world premieres alongside a strand highlighting the struggles of oppressed people across the globe. The festival will take place Friday 3–Sunday 12 May, and tickets for all events are available now. 

Highlights from the programme include the Scottish premiere of Irish auteur Pat Collins’ new documentary Songlines, a poetic celebration of the songs and singers at the heart of the Irish traveller community. The premiere will be prefaced by a short concert of Scottish traveller songs from Jess Smith and Joss Cameron. Also receiving premieres are Je’vida, about an elderly Sámi woman forced to reckon with her past; Itu Ninu, the story of two climate migrants who, stuck within a dystopian ‘smart city’, find connection through their shared heritage within Mixtec language; and the brand-new score for the 1930 classic Earth, composed by Scottish musicians Luke Sutherland (Long Fin Killie, Bows, Rev Magnetic) and Semay Lu.

The festival will also strike a tone of solidarity with those suffering the consequences of brutal conflict and genocide across the world, starting with 1995’s Tale Of The Three Jewels, a moving tribute to the children of Gaza and offering an alternative perspective upon the injustices faced by Gaza’s oppressed communities. Also being screened are Shadows Of Forgotten Ancestors, a feted piece of Ukrainian cinema from 1965 which will be introduced with a mini-concert from Edinburgh’s Ukrainian Choir, and Mapantsula, a slice of guerrilla filmmaking produced under extreme censorship in apartheid South Africa in 1988. 

Festival producer Jamie Chambers said, ‘We’re thrilled to be celebrating 10 years of the Folk Film Gathering with a programme that looks back over the first decade of our life as the world’s first folk film festival, through a selection of films both old and new. 

‘In particular, our programme this year has been carefully conceived to explore how we might encourage solidarities between Scotland and the rest of the world at this point in 2024, in positioning films representing the experiences of communities in Scotland in counterpoint with those of communities elsewhere in the world. 

‘In doing so we seek to look outwards from the local to the global, exploring how cinema can help us foster greater empathy and understanding for experiences beyond our own. Cinema has an important role to play in how we remember the past and approach the present, and in how communities in Scotland may conceive of our place and responsibilities within the world.’

For the first time since the pandemic, Folk Film Gathering will once again take place alongside Edinburgh’s Tradfest, a celebration of traditional music from Scotland and around the world. 

Edinburgh’s Folk Film Gathering will take place from Friday 3–Sunday 12 May; tickets for all events are available now.