It made me feel, like, empowered
but also just, wow, imagine if this was someone I knew.
There's this really good documentary called He Named Me Malala
which tells the back story and the tale of Malala's protest
and where she's come from and where she is now,
and it's a really good film.
She's from Pakistan and they can't have an education there, girls,
and she was actually shot in the side of the head by the Taliban
when she was fifteen,
so obviously she was so brave to stand up and do speeches
and fight for these rights.
Let us pick up our books and our pens.
They are our most powerful weapons.
One child,
one teacher,
one book, and one pen can change the world.
You can really see from this film that she really is so humble
and passionate about her education.
She has no ulterior motive, even though she's got so famous.
It's just amazing to see how truly dedicated she is
to activism for this cause.
One of the film's minor narratives is showing her dad
and how they're quite similar.
Papa, look down.
When she was very small, many friends used to come to our home.
We used to talk about politics, we used to talk about the basic rights,
and she used to sit with us.
The film I watched was The Hate U Give,
and it's really interesting because at first,
her parents are more hesitant to let her speak up
about the issues she faced.
So, in the film, she sees her childhood best friend,
who is an unarmed black teenager, get shot by a policeman,
and she is the witness of this thing,
and her parents are initially really hesitant
about letting her go public about this information
and sharing what she witnessed in real time,
because they wanted to protect her identity
and were afraid that she would get death threat letters.
So I think it's interesting that Malala,
despite being in this environment, as you said, like Pakistan
where there's a very big threat at the time,
is able to openly be herself all this time,
but Starr faces this dichotomy of being
the teenager that everyone expects her to be versus herself who is,
kind of, this mixture of the two worlds that she lives in.
Definitely, in family life as well, where you would think
you would have had free reign to be whoever you needed to be.
Her uncle is a cop and she's always thought that,
if she was in that situation, if she just acted as she was meant to,
she would be alright.
But throughout the course of the movie,
she realises that that sometimes isn't enough.
The most, I think, impactful moment of this movie on me
was at the end, when she finally stands up and speaks up for herself,
saying, 'I am the witness and this isn't right.'
I am the witness!
But so are y'all.
Yeah!
We are all witnesses to this injustice!
(crowd) Yeah!
The kind of split personality that she has
and the people that she surrounds herself with,
and I think this really highlights, in this film,
the contrast of communities that she's involved with.
Because at her high school, which is Williamson,
she's friends with Maya and Hailey,
and as you see the film progress, as these events happen, you kind of see
the side to them that their attitudes are just so different.
And that's not necessarily bad, especially at first,
but it gets to this breaking point for Starr
because Hailey, she just can't understand her anymore.
She really comes into her own.
I think that's such an important part of this youth activism.
- Yeah, definitely.
People end up, you know, defying what maybe they've expected
of themselves or society does,
and just speaking their mind, even if it's against the state
or anything that they should be doing.
Yeah, and it's so amazing as well because they're so young
and they have to deal with all these different issues
just because they're a little bit different in some ways,
and not even all the time.
But I think it really deals with a lot of subjects
that can, sort of, resonate with today,
because each generation, as it goes on,
they're getting more and more confident
to protest for what they stand for.
(hip-hop music)
What? What's wrong?
This isn't right.
Who else is gonna speak up for our people, girl?
Our people?
Where are you going?
People like Hailey are so fixed in their attitudes, and it really
highlights the issue that the film is trying to address in the first place.
- I also watched Pride. - That's a great film.
It's such a good film.
If you haven't watched it, definitely go and do it.
It's about this movement, a real movement in the '80s,
of LGSM, which is Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners,
and it's about these queer people supporting the miners
that were coming under threat under Margaret Thatcher's government,
because they related to this struggle that they were having
on a fundamental level of getting their voices heard
and people understanding their point of view.
Not worried about being too visible this time?
Shut up and march.
(brass band playing)
I think also, it's just, the real charm of this movie is seeing
all the different characters, kind of,
overcoming their initial prejudice or thoughts.
Well, it's incredible to see such a mix of people here tonight,
gay and straight.
Can you see what we've done here by coming together, all of us,
by pledging our solidarity, our friendship?
We've made history.
(cheering, applause)
And it's this really beautiful progression of seeing them
being welcomed in this community slowly to then becoming friends
and, you know, talking easily.
There's this comparison of speeches that, you know,
starts off with all of them being really hostile
and walking out as soon as the speech is over
to them holding this benefit ball, and Dai gets on stage and he's like,
'We've made history, all of us,' and they can joke about it together.
They can joke about, oh, the women here,
about all the gays, the lesbians, the unsure.
Just everyone.
Yeah, and it becomes this whole big community of unlikely friendships.
Welcome, ladies and gentlemen.
To the gays, (cheering)
to the straights, (cheering)
and to the as-yet undecided. (laughter, cheering)
Welcome to the Electric Ballroom, Camden,
for this, the first ever Pits and Perverts benefit ball!
(cheering)
And I know you watched-, I've never heard of this one actually.
So the film I watched was 120 BPM, Beats Per Minute,
and it is so, so good. I really recommend you watch it.
Like you said, us learning the history of these issues,
it makes us kind of respect it more today,
and that was definitely the case in this film,
because this film was based around a true group called Act Up Paris,
and they protested for-, I couldn't get my word.
They protested for AIDS in the 1990s,
trying to encourage finding drugs and cures to help it.
And there is this really good scene and it's at the start of the film,
and it kind of flashes back.
So it's the group meeting in this kind of
big classroom auditorium thing,
and discussing how their last protest went,
and it flashes back and it's them marching on the stage to this,
I don't know if he's something to do with
politics or pharmaceutical companies.
And they march on and they're blowing whistles, and they throw
fake blood at this man. - Oh, wow.
Yeah, and it's a really intense film.
I heard a voice say, 'Hey, it's you next.'
So once I had a window,
once I saw Bernin, I felt I had to go for it.
(gasping)
We've screwed up before.
He threw the blood too soon. It's no big deal.
No big deal, even if I looked dumb, talking alone.
No worries.
The real problem came after.
Two people pounced on Bernin,
really roughly
and handcuffed him to a post.
But it just-, each bit shows you
just how much passion they have to find this, because I know, obviously,
they teamed up with the miners in your film, didn't they?
And they were so passionate about that,
but in this film, in 120 BPM, it's so intense
because they're protesting for their lives.
Parade my corpse with whistles and foghorns.
Don't use my ashes. They're for my parents.
I'm saying it now
because, even though I'm afraid, I haven't suffered yet
but I know I will.
The lovely thing about these films is you really get
that sense of community and unity. - Absolutely, yeah.
Even from, like, whether it be within what you would expect,
but also from unexpected allies and people who come out and help.
- Yeah, exactly, because the group was made up
not only of HIV-positive people, but friends of them
who care about it just as much,
and it shows how much you can get involved with things,
and not just because you're part of it but because you care about it.
Obviously, a really important theme in these activism films
is the sacrifice that the characters are making
just to protest for these issues.
So in the film Suffragette, I don't know if you've seen it,
but these women-, I think it was set in 1912 or something like that,
so we're talking hundreds of years ago,
these women are protesting for the vote,
and what really strikes me about that
is that you really see police brutality.
There's this one scene at the start where there must be hundreds of women
and there's police beating them up and everything.
(crowd shouting)
Get back!
Move back now, come on!
Go home!
- Back, back! - Ow!
Violet!
(crowd screaming)
And, you know, they had no human rights or anything like that.
Their expression was so unwelcomed
and it's different to, kind of, now when you see women's marches,
it's not the same sacrifice that we would put on or take.
It's interesting because you said it's 100 years ago,
which could seem like a really long time ago,
but in this kind of context, it doesn't feel like it.
(crowd screaming)
(screams)
And the film itself is actually directed by a woman,
and I think it can be really important to have
that insider perspective when you're dealing with these sensitive issues,
to do it justice and to respect it.
So Selma is this, you know, set in the 1960s,
and it's got these iconic figures that everyone's heard about
like Martin Luther King Jr. and all these people,
and they're trying to basically bring attention to the lack of rights
in Selma especially, to do with voting as well.
Recite the Constitution's preamble. Know what a preamble is?
We the people of the United States,
in order to form a more perfect union,
establish justice,
ensure domestic tranquillity,
provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare-,
How many county judges in Alabama?
67.
Name them.
There's this moment where they all have this march
outside to the court house, and they're all standing outside
and the police chief is going, 'You have no right to be here,'
and they're like, 'Well, yes we do,
because we have the right to register to vote.'
'You're refusing us, we have the right to protest about it.'
And it's like all these really logical reasons
and they just turn them away on the basis of race,
and they break out into violence.
There are lots of moments in this film where, you know,
they're just peacefully protesting, they're marching,
and it just escalates to the point where
this young man dies protecting his family.
But despite it, the police brutality just continues.
(screaming, struggling)
It shows that, despite progress being made,
there's still a lot of way to go.
And in this film, what it really means is that you see this community,
despite knowing the risks that they face speaking up about it,
they keep going,
and I'm sure this is the same in Suffragette.
They just-, they know what they're going up against,
but they know that for the future generations,
for their families, for their children,
that they have to just keep protesting.
(gospel music)
From the hospital came reports of victims
suffering fractures of ribs, heads, arms, legs.
The Negro leader John Lewis,
despite injury from a possible skull fracture,
led the marchers back to the chapel after the encounter with officers.
Help!
So overall, what film did you find most impactful?
I mean, all of them in different ways,
but I think I'd have to say The Hate U Give
because watching it now, it's very current,
because it only came out a year or two ago.
And the fact that it's a young person protesting,
she really came from being a normal girl
to escalating to this really quickly,
and I think that really made me feel empowered
but also just-, - Good?
It just kept me, like, wow, imagine if this was someone I knew,
because it really felt like it could be.
But what about you?
I think, out of all of them, the one that impacted me the most,
my favourite one, was definitely 120 BPM.
I just found-, my hair was raising,
it was goosebumps all the way through.
I think that in places, it is harrowing and haunting,
but it's one of them, to get the message across,
it's a necessary thing.
And also, what I loved about the film is that
it's telling these human stories and it broke boundaries.
It wasn't afraid of including any type of narrative.
We saw it all because it was life or death.
So, thanks for watching.
We really hope you enjoyed this video.
If you have any comments about anything we said or any other
movie recommendations, make sure you comment them down below.