Focus: Rage & Horror

Focus: Rage & Horror

»The very expression of anger in a context of everyday life is liberating for women.« – Martha Rosler

A perpetual state of crisis is a genuinely fear-inducing prospect. Why don’t we rage against it? Rage & Horror, the theme of this year’s Focus, is an invitation to think about a more constructive approach to rage. It shows films made between 1899 and the present day that are a platform for angry female visions, whether they are monstrous or heroic or a chaotic combination of both. Brutal, supernaturally powerful, activistic, comic, uninhibited, supportive. We shine a light on women who express their anger without restraint.

Expressing anger is a bold and threatening act of defiance and rebellion. Anger is loaded with information and energy, said Audre Lorde in her 1981 speech entitled »The Uses of Anger«. Her fear of anger taught her nothing, she claimed. On the contrary, anger was her response to racism. By recognising their anger, women can detect discrimination and develop strategies to defend themselves against it. And so we search for enraged women in film history from 1899 until the present day – ignoring the constraints of genre boundaries.

Curators:

Previous Focus topics have included:
THE CONNECTION: Between Plants, Humans and other Animals (2021)
After Reunification 1990 | 2020 (2020)
Image Traps (2019)
In Control (2017)
Comfort (2015)
Excess (2013)
NOW WHAT – Films about Getting out of Here (2011)
Freedom (2009)
Music (2007)
Money (2005)
Kiss-proof: who’s kissing who, when and why? (2001)
Uncanny Pleasure (1997)
The Subversive Power of Laughter (1993)
The Female Machine Saboteurs (1991)

A practical self-defence course against zombies and slashers, in which the boundary between screen and audience is blurred. Out-of-control monsters […]