Arsenal on Location: Pioneers of Black British Cinema - PRESSURE (UK 1976) von Horace Ové

In cooperation with Arsenal on Location , City Kino Wedding is presenting the film series Pioneers of Black British Cinema from June 27 to 29, 2025 with groundbreaking cinematic works created between the 1970s and 1990s. At this time, filmmakers such as Horace Ové, Ngozi Onwurah, Menelik Shabazz, John Akomfrah and Isaac Julien increasingly succeeded in questioning the prevailing ideologies of the (white) film and television industry and confronting them with alternative images of a "Black Britain". The selection of five film programs takes into account intersectional perspectives and confrontations with the (post)colonial history of Great Britain.

Further program information: https://www.arsenal-berlin.de/kino/filmreihe/city-kino-wedding-pioneers-of-black-british-cinema/

Friday, June 27, 2025, 8 p.m.
PRESSURE (UK 1976) by Horace Ové

Trinidadian-born filmmaker Horace Ové (1936-2023) was the first black director to make a feature-length film in the UK in 1975. With funding from the BFI, he directed PRESSURE in a neo-realist style in the West London district of Ladbroke Grove. The plot follows London-born 16-year-old Tony (Herbert Norville) as he tries to find his place in society. As a school graduate looking for work, he is confronted with the conservative lifestyle of his religious parents from Trinidad, his brother's political Black Power ideology and racist prejudices in British society. In this way, Ové impressively illustrates the dilemma of the children of the so-called "Windrush generation", who were looking for ways to identify themselves between the lack of acceptance in their home country and their parents' dreams of a Caribbean homeland.

German premiere of the 4K restoration by the BFI National Archive and the Film Foundation.