The Forum Blog
A Life Less Ordinary: The First Female War Correspondents
By Alex Glynn The changing face of war reporting for female journalists was the topic of conversation at the Frontline Club on Tuesday 11 February, with a special insight into two women who pioneered the trade – Clare Hollingworth and Gerda Taro.
South Sudan: nation building through football
By Richard Nield On Monday 10 February, the Frontline Club hosted a BBC Storyville Preview screening of Coach Zoran and His African Tigers, an at once inspiring and saddening tale of the exploits and frustrations of the national football team of the world’s youngest nation, South Sudan. The film tells the story of Zoran Djordjevic, the […]
Blurred Borders: The Consequences of Over-Spill from Conflict in Syria
by Sally Ashley-Cound On Thursday 6 February at the Frontline Club, Dan Smith, secretary general of International Alert, chaired a panel which discussed the impact of the war in Syria on the surrounding states.
‘A World Not Ours’ – And A Story That Now Is
By Lizzie Kendal On Friday 7 February, the Frontline Club was fully booked and the audience buzzed with anticipation for the screening of A World Not Ours followed by a Q&A with director Mahdi Fleifel, editor Michael Aaglund and a last-minute addition of producer Patrick Campbell. The film is set in the Palestinian refugee camp of Ain […]
More Alive Than The Living: Putin’s Olympic Dream
By George Symonds “We used to say health to the people. Now we say health to the rich only.” On Monday 3 February 2014, the Frontline Club screened the UK premier of Putin’s Olympic Dream. Director Hans Pool shone light onto the crooked nature of Putin’s very own “fake smile.” Behind the facade of the […]
An Evening of Shorts: Documenting the Past and Its Memories
By Antonia Roupell On Friday 31 January, the audience was taken on a cinematic journey of insights from Tibet, Japan, Romania, Afghanistan and the UAE during an evening of Shorts at the Frontline Club. The selection showed five very different but equally compelling short documentaries. This time the films provoked thoughts on the consequences of tourism on ancient […]
Small Communities, Big Mountains: The Future for Afghanistan’s Rural People
By Lizzie Kendal On Wednesday 29 January, the Frontline club hosted another packed Afghanistan-focused event. Journey to the Roof of the World was a photography event hosted in partnership with Port Magazine and featured a discussion between French photographer Frédéric Lagrange and Rory Stewart MP, chaired by The Independent’s defence correspondent, Kim Sengupta.
Iran: A New Chapter That is Yet to Start
By Sally Ashley-Cound On 28 January at the Frontline Club, a panel chaired by CBS News correspondent Elizabeth Palmer discussed the possible start of a new chapter for Iran following the election of Hassan Rouhani as president. Rouhani is not only in favour with the Supreme Leader and political hardliners but also backed by reformists, due to […]
Here Be Dragons: the “post-traumatic world” of Albania
By Phoebe Hall On Monday 27 January a large audience gathered at the Frontline Club for a screening of Mark Cousins’ contemplative essay-film Here Be Dragons, followed by a Q&A with the director, via Skype, and with producer Don Boyd, founder of HiBROW.
The Dos and Don’ts of Data Journalism
by Sally Ashley-Cound “Don’t be seduced.” Michael Blastland ended the first panel at the Frontline Club on Thursday 23 January.
Is Traditional Media Actually Dying and Does it Matter?
by Sally Ashley-Cound “That four thousand word report from the Syrian refugee camp…will not be read as much as ‘10 cats that have got thoughts about Syria’,” New Statesman‘s Deputy Editor Helen Lewis said in her opening statement on the second panel of the Grapevine event at the Frontline Club on Thursday 23 January. Read […]
The Changing Face of News Gathering: Getting In On The Action
By Antonia Roupell Blackberry Messenger, Google Maps, YouTube and other less conventional information hubs were put under scrutiny on the 21 January at the Frontline Club. Richard Pendry, a journalist and lecturer at the University of Kent, chaired the fully booked discussion titled: The Changing Face of News Gathering. Well-versed in the art of unconventional […]
Oscar-nominated documentary about Egyptian revolution screens at the Frontline Club
By Helena Williams On the day the 2014 Academy Awards Nominations were announced, the Frontline Club hosted a screening of The Square. After winning the Audience Award at both Sundance and the Toronto International Film Festival, the film is now in the run-up for an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature. The Square portrays the Egyptian revolution and […]
The “Ambiguous World” of the Organ Black Market
By Ratha Lehall On Monday 13 January, the Frontline Club hosted a screening of Tales from the Organ Trade followed by a Q&A session with director Ric Esther Bienstock. Bienstock introduced the film briefly, telling the audience it took three years to make, covers eight countries, and comprises five different languages. Tales from the Organ Trade presents the different […]
After Tiller: The Grey Area of Late-Term Abortions
By Antonia Roupell The nature of death, the right to justify it, and the value of human choice. There are few documentaries that deal with these weighty issues as uncompromisingly as After Tiller. The award winning film by co-directors Martha Shane and Lana Wilson revolves around the four remaining doctors in the US who are willing […]
What does the future hold for South Sudan?
By Alex Glynn The audience packed out the Frontline Club for the first event of the year on 8 January, a testament to the subject that has been dominating international headlines for the last few weeks – the crisis in South Sudan. A panel of experts from different fields, chaired by Channel 4 international editor Lindsey […]
Insight with Jineth Bedoya Lima “The bodies of women are weapons in all wars”
By Phoebe Hall On Wednesday 4 December the Frontline Club welcomed Jineth Bedoya Lima, a journalist with Colombian national newspaper El Tiempo and recipient of the 2012 International Women of Courage Award, to discuss her prolific journalistic career and work in combatting violence against women. The discussion, chaired by The Guardian’s Ed Vulliamy, largely focused on the “habitual, extensive, and systematic […]
“His insight was that his oppressors were afraid of him” – Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom + Q&A
By Fred Heritage On Monday 25 November an audience gathered at the Frontline Club for a preview screening of the new biopic of Nelson Mandela, based on his autobiographical book, Long Walk to Freedom. The film, starring London born actor Idris Elba in the title role, intimately portrays the iconic figure throughout his life, against the […]
None to Blame but All to Suffer: The Carbon Crooks + Q&A
By George Symonds What do a dead poet, organised crime and the air we breathe have in common? On Thursday 21 November the Frontline Club screened The Carbon Crooks – director Tom Heinemann’s exposé of the massive fraud and failures within global carbon trading schemes. Heinemann introduced his picture thus: “This film is a about […]
Exploring new technology with drone journalism
By Greta Hofmann With the dangers of reporting and documenting conflict or uprisings claiming many lives every year, drones seem to be a practical and safe alternative to otherwise dangerous missions. On Wednesday 20 November, the Frontline Club hosted a panel discussion chaired by Richard Sambrook, professor of journalism at Cardiff University and a former BBC […]
The changing state of reporting on Syria
by Sally Ashley-Cound It is becoming more and more dangerous to report from inside Syria. At the Frontline Club on 19 November a panel chaired by Stuart Hughes, a senior world affairs producer with BBC News and in association with the Overseas Press Club, discussed how reporting has changed since the conflict began and how […]
Twenty Years of War Reporting: “A good moment for us is often the worst for them”
By Caroline Schmitt In October the Frontline Club held a tenth anniversary exhibition at the Prix Bayeux Awards and on 13 November they welcomed Prix Bayeux to London for an event to celebrate their twentieth anniversary. The event brought together past winners who each presented their distinguished pieces of reporting and looked back on 20 years of reporting conflict. The evening was […]
“Envy is the Central Fact of American Life“ – Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia + Director Q&A
By Greta Hoffman On 11 November, the Frontline Club hosted the screening of Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia. Finished less than a year after Vidal’s death, the film gave an intimate and in-depth insight into Vidal’s life and career as a writer and political commentator. The screening was followed by a lively Q&A […]
North Korea – life inside the secret state, the women who fight back and getting the outside world in
by Sally Ashley-Cound North Korea is the most totalitarian regime still in existence, yet knowledge of the outside world is slowly but relentlessly filtering in, in the form of USB sticks and wind-up radios. Channel 4’s Dispatches followed North Korean defector Mr Chung and Japanese journalist Jiro Ishimaru, who smuggle information and video footage in […]
Has the NSA spying gone too far and what damage has been done?
by Sally Ashley-Cound Following the latest revelations from whistleblower Edward Snowden, the Frontline Club’s First Wednesday panel on 6 November gathered to discuss Has NSA spying “reached too far”? Chair Owen Bennett-Jones, a freelance journalist and a host of Newshour on the BBC World Service started off by asking if anyone really knows how much […]
“To get justice you need truth” – No Fire Zone: The Killing Fields of Sri Lanka + Director Q&A
By Ratha Lehall On 5 November, No Fire Zone was shown at Riverside Studios as part of a series of Between the Lines follow up events hosted by Frontline Club and DocHouse. This documentary chronicles the last 138 days of the civil war in Sri Lanka, revealing the brutal tactics employed by the Sri Lankan army and government against the Tamil population. […]
The Sochi Project: Documenting the run up to the 2014 Winter Olympics in a city with no snow
by Sally Ashley-Cound In 2007, what would become the most expensive Olympic Games in history was announced. Sochi, on the banks of the Black Sea and known as the Florida of Russia – complete with palm trees and sandy beaches – would host the 2014 Winter Olympic Games. The story caught the attention of filmmaker […]
The Bombing of al-Bara: The Camera That Captured It
By Antonia Roupell On 29 October, exactly one year and one day after the bombing of al-Bara in northern Syria, an audience gathered in the Ritzy Cinema to watch filmmaker Olly Lambert’s extraordinary footage of the attacks. The Bombing of al-Bara screening was hosted by the Frontline Club and DocHouse as part of a series of Between […]
The Engineer: “Cases worse than horror films”
By Caroline Schmitt On Monday 28 October, the Frontline Club screened The Engineer, a documentary uncovering the extent of gang violence in El Salvador directed by Mathew Charles and Juan Passarelli. The Q&A that followed was chaired by Stephen Jukes, Dean of the Media School at Bournemouth University. The Engineer portrays the work of Israel Ticas, […]
Filming the Unfilmable: Between The Lines Evening of Shorts
By Antonia Roupell Between the Lines Follow-Up Events once more succeeded in showcasing a diverse range of films at the Frontline Club on the 25th October. Each of the five documentaries opened a window onto a subject rarely documented from places like North Korea, Yemen and Iraq. Multimedia journalist, Adrian Branco and filmmakers Jason Lee and Tim Travers Hawkins were present […]
