Britain’s biggest independent film festival, Raindance is considered a champion of maverick filmmaking on a limited budget. Raindance celebrates these bold, creative, and risk-taking filmmakers with the Raindance Maverick Award at the annual BIFAs (British Independent Film Awards C.I.C), the awards ceremony founded by Raindance in 1998. Formally the Raindance Discovery Award, changes have been made to reflect the spirit of the award –maverick filmmaking on a limited budget – and includes a rise in budget cap from £500k to £1m, and no limit on UK theatrical distribution.
This year’s BIFA Raindance Maverick Award longlist comprises 11 remarkable films. Documentaries lead the selection with 9 longlisted docs tackling topics as diverse as climate change, youth violence, and confronting terminal illness. Two features complete the longlist.
“The Raindance Maverick Award longlist captures all that is radical and rebellious about independent cinema,” says Elliot Grove, founder of Raindance and BIFA. “Raindance will always be a place to discover maverick films, and we are thrilled to champion these risk-takers and rule-breakers.”
A strange story from Somerset, A LIFE ON THE FARM documents a filmmaking farmer and the inspiring legacy of his long-lost home movies. Inside the core of the climate movement, concerned citizens in Germany and England put their bodies on the line to stop new coal mines being developed in FINITE: THE CLIMATE OF CHANGE. As youth violence rises in London, a rebellious group of young people tear through the city’s streets in the name of ‘Knives Down, Bikes Up’ in IF THE STREETS WERE ON FIRE. While navigating daily discrimination, a filmmaker explores what it takes to love oneself fiercely despite the pervasiveness of ableism in IS THERE ANYBODY OUT THERE? Void of any language, Lawand struggles to piece together his surroundings in his new home in Derbyshire after a traumatic year of seeking asylum in NAME ME LAWAND. Faced with a terminal diagnosis, a filmmaker enlists his family on an intimate and darkly humorous journey in RED HERRING. In THE TASTE OF MANGO, the filmmaker probes raw questions her mother and grandmother have long brushed aside. HOW WE WATCHED documents how independent news reporting in India and beyond is increasingly under threat by budgetary cuts and extremists leveraging alternative platforms to spread misinformation. And YOUR FAT FRIEND documents the rise of Aubrey Gordon, from anonymous blogger to bestselling author.
Set in 1973 on an uninhabited island off the Cornish coast, a wildlife volunteer’s daily observations of a rare flower turn into a metaphysical journey that forces her to question what is real and what is a nightmare in ENYS MEN. An undocumented Filipina immigrant lands a job as a care worker for a terminal old man, but a dark discovery threatens to destroy everything she’s strived for in RAGING GRACE.
The list includes our very own RED HERRING, directed by Kit Vincent, screening at this year’s festival, which is already completely sold out.
Full Longlist
A LIFE ON THE FARM – Oscar Harding
ENYS MEN – Mark Jenkin, Denzil Monk
FINITE: THE CLIMATE OF CHANGE – Rich Felgate
IF THE STREETS WERE ON FIRE – Alice Russell, Gannesh Rajah
IS THERE ANYBODY OUT THERE? – Ella Glendining, Janine Marmot
NAME ME LAWAND – Edward Lovelace
RAGING GRACE – Paris Zarcilla, Chi Thai
RED HERRING – Kit Vincent, Ed Owles
THE TASTE OF MANGO – Chloe Abrahams, Elliot Whitton
WHILE WE WATCHED – Vinay Shukla, Luke Moody, Kushboo Ranka
YOUR FAT FRIEND – Jeanie Finlay
Previous recipients include Ben Wheatley, receiving an early accolade for his first feature Down Terrace. The BIFA Raindance Discovery Award was presented in 2022 to Hassan Nazer’s Winners, the story of two children from a small Iranian community who discover the lost Academy Award statuette of Asghar Faradi.
The final list of nominations will be announced on Thursday 2 November, winner announcements at the BIFA awards ceremony on Sunday 3 December.
Raindance promotes and supports independent filmmaking and filmmakers.
From new and emerging to industry pros, Raindance connects, trains, supports, and promotes visual storytellers through every step of their career.
The Raindance Film Festival runs each Autumn in London’s Leicester Square.
Raindance has been delivering film training since 1992. A wide range of Open Classes to a 2 year HND Level 5 BTEC in Moving Images to a Postgraduate Film Degree are delivered to students on five continents, both in person and online.
