Past Events and Screenings

The Tyrants and Cults Club Quiz: Panorama reporter John Sweeney will test Frontline members on their knowledge of dictators, secret policemen, the wonderful Church of Scientology and the sinister mind-control cult ruled by lizards known as the BBC.

This week, quiz champions will win six tickets to see two shows included in the London International Festival of Theatre summer programme. Don’t miss this great offer and book your place for the Club Quiz now!

Teams can consist of up to six people and the entry cost is £5 per person. All money raised goes to the Frontline Fund, assisting families of fixers and support staff killed or injured while working with the international media.

Pakistan’s largest province, Balochistan, lies at a crossroads. Bordering Iran and Afghanistan and boasting huge reserves of gold, gas, oil and uranium, it is a land of enormous strategic importance and great natural beauty and yet it remains all but inaccessible to the outside world. With access to foreign journalists all but non-existent, and permanent expulsion or physical intimidation often the price for transgressing its boundaries, Willem Marx and Marc Wattrelot offer a rare insight into an area that has become one of the most hermetic and dangerous on earth.

This event is organised by Human Rights Watch.

Join The Guardian’s Liz Ford and members of the Women’s Rights Division at Human Rights Watch in a discussion about their work and the challenges they face in working to protect the rights and improve the lives of women and girls around the world.

Jang Jin-sung, a poet laureate for North Korea, led a privileged life unaware of the suffering of his fellow countrymen. It was only following a visit to his home town, where he witnessed suffering, starvation and unimaginable poverty, that he began to question the system in which he lived. What followed is an extraordinary story of awakening, terror and escape. Jang Jin-sung will be joining us to share his story and give us an insight in to the circles of power and privilege in North Korea.

Join us for an evening of short documentaries, from different parts of the world, covering a wide range of topics. Shorts at the Frontline Club showcases moving, striking and funny films, exploring the many different faces of documentary filmmaking. This month’s six films will take you from the futuristic city of Ordos in inner Mongolia to a slum in Kenya; from Romania under communism to the inner world of war veterans; and from Tibet to Myanmar.

Standpoint magazine brings together a distinguished panel to debate Britain’s response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea.

Dear Members, please join us for our May meet-up, with drinks kindly supplied by Chivas Regal. Please RSVP to Membership Co-ordinator, Sophie Nagovitsyna.

Showcase is a new event that incorporates the best of Frontline: compelling debate, inquisitive film, insightful discussion, thought-provoking surroundings, stimulating company and refreshing beverages. The evenings will feature two sessions of film or discussion with a break between when you will be welcomed into the members’ clubroom. Here you can meet your fellow audience members and enjoy a drink courtesy of Chivas Regal. For the first in the series we will be exploring the newly launched VICE News.

A Thousand Times Good Night tells the moving story of leading conflict photojournalist Rebecca (played by Oscar-winner Juliette Binoche) who is torn between a passion for her perilous work and love of her family. Her husband (played by Game of Thrones star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and daughter can no longer bear the thought of her dying for her work. She is given an ultimatum: her work, or her family life. This screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Erik Poppe moderated by Gavin Rees from the Dart Centre Europe.

In the summer of 2013, Michal Przedlacki and Wojciech Szumowski spent 44 days in Aleppo, documenting the lives of ordinary citizens in extraordinary circumstances. Aleppo. Notes From the Dark offers a unique and poignant account of life in Aleppo from the perspective of seven of its residents. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with co-directors Michal Przedlacki and Wojciech Szumowski.

This year for the first time, the Hetherington family is inviting all Tim’s friends and colleagues to share their reflections on the anniversary of Tim’s death. It will be a free flowing discussion about Tim’s influence and continuing inspiration, including a sneak peek of Sebastian Junger’s forthcoming film sparked by a conversation with Tim, a creative moment that is actually captured on film.

The infamous Club Quiz returns in April with quizmasters Caroline Johns and Dr Keith Surridge.

Teams can consist of up to six people and the entry cost is £5 per person. All money raised goes to the Frontline Fund, assisting families of fixers and support staff killed or injured while working with the international media.

We are flooded with images taken by cameras and phones which often struggle to have the impact that they did 50 years ago. In a society that has become so desensitised to photographs of war, can illustration be used to better encapsulate a situation and connect with the viewer? Illustrator George Butler will present his drawings from war-torn Syria as we consider whether there is still room for illustration in hard-news stories.

For 12 years, Oleg Klimov documented the disintegration of the Soviet Union. Throughout the 1990s he witnessed almost all the conflicts and ethnic tensions of the region. Personally affected by his experiences as a war photographer and longing for inner peace, Klimov returns to some of the areas he photographed during wartime: Nagorno-Karabakh, Abkhazia and Chechnya. This screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Masha Novikova in person and photographer Oleg Klimov via Skype.

On 6 April 1994, a plane carrying Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana was shot down over Kigali airport. The events that followed saw bitter ethnic divisions engulf the country: neighbour turned on neighbour and in the space of 100 days an estimated 800,000 Rwandans, mostly Tutsis, were killed. Twenty years on we will look at how communities in Rwanda have been reconciled and whether the international community has learnt its lessons and if it can ensure that such a failure to react will never occur again.

On the evening of 11 June 2013, the Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras pulled the plug on ERT, Greece’s public broadcaster, after 75 years of continuous operation. The silencing of public television resulted in a political conflict and provoked protests in a country already divided. This screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Yorgos Avgeropoulos.

In 2011 the law ‘On Access to Public Information’ was adopted in Ukraine. Open Access brings together five stories of people in different parts of the country trying to invoke the law to access information. Told by five directors, these stories all illustrate the lack of transparency, indifference, dominance of private motifs and lack of responsibility by the country’s leaders. The screening will be followed by a Q&A via Skype with Ukrainian journalist and protagonist Sergii Leshchenko.

Members, new and old, please join us for our April meetup, with drinks kindly supplied by Chivas Regal. Please RSVP to Membership Co-ordinator, Sophie Nagovitsyna.

This event is organised in partnership with BBC World Service.
As Afghanistan gears up for a pivotal presidential election we will be bringing together a panel of experts to take an in-depth look at the candidates and what they are offering.

In 2011, director Rachel Beth Anderson followed two friends who abandoned their peaceful lives in Canada and returned to their home country of Libya to fight in the revolution. Hamid (26) and Tarek (21) had never fired a gun, but in 2011 they ran recklessly towards war, fuelled by their hatred of Muammar Gaddafi and their desire to be part of history. This screening will be followed by a Q&A with co-directors Rachel Beth Anderson and Tim Grucza.