A First Look At The Barbican's Chronic Youth Festival 2025
- Anushree Anand
- 1 day ago
- 3 min read
For a single opportune weekend this April, the Barbican Centre hosts the Chronic Youth Film Festival, featuring films that chronicle the experience of youth as they move through the world. This year’s films, with the theme 'Against All Odds' in mind, are carefully curated stories of curiosity, resilience, and strength that show the indomitable spirit of youth in action. With films set in 1970s Paris all the way to a dystopian future Japan, the Chronic Youth Film Festival 2025 has a fantastic, well-rounded and thoughtful programme. Here’s what the festival looks like, starting at noon on Saturday, the 26th of April.
All events at the Film Festival are divided between four locations in the Barbican Centre - the Conservatory, Cinema 1, Cinema 2, and Cinema 3. The very first event you can attend at the Festival is the Scavenger Hunt, taking place at the Conservatory on Saturday from 12:00-4:00 PM. Occurring in 45-minute slots, you can uncover hidden items related to the various films programmed at the Festival. The Tiger Writing Workshop begins at 12:15 PM and focuses on ideas of masculinity, and is open to all experience levels. The UK premiere of Tiger takes place at 1:45 PM in Cinema 2. Tiger, set in the Dominican Republic and directed by José María Cabral, centres a fourteen-year-old boy in a vicious boot camp that enforces machismo, and goes on to portray the malleability of masculinity. Continuing on in Cinema 2, the next films on the programme are Apostles of Cinema and Talking about Trees, screening together to construct a heart-warming narrative of reviving the East African film industry. Apostles of Cinema, a short film from Tanzania directed by Darragh Amelia, Cece Mlay, Jesse Gerard Mpango and Gertrude Malizana, discusses the underground nature of Tanzanian film culture, described as 'Swahiliwood'. Talking about Trees, directed by Suhaib Gasmelbari, is a documentary that discusses the efforts taken to rebuild Khartoum’s film industry.
The Collage and Community Cookbook event takes place on both Saturday and Sunday, from 1:30-6:00 PM on the former and 12:00-6:00 PM on the latter. This event, held in the foyer of Cinema 2 and Cinema 3, invites people to make collages or craft recipes for a communal cookbook, and embodies the idea of food as a love language.
The final events of Saturday both surround Happyend, focusing on teenagers in an authoritarian school who find ways to have fun, providing the audience with a unique take on the role of music in society. Beginning at 4:30 PM in the Conservatory, the Happyend Live Music Experience is an experiential prequel to the film itself, using similar techno-futuristic beats to get audiences in the mood. At 6:05 PM in Cinema 1, the screening of Happyend is the final event of Saturday, and also features a pre-recorded Q&A with the director, Neo Sora.
The second and final day of the Festival begins at 1:30 PM in Cinema 3, with Dessert for Constance, a film featuring Senegalese sweepers who venture into the French culinary scene. Directed by Sarah Maldodor, it is a retelling of a timeless immigrant experience. The programme continues in Cinema 3 with the Shorts billing of the festival. The shorts programme, under the title 'Not Here, But Everywhere', features six short films from Ireland, the United Kingdom, Scotland, Algeria/France, and Canada. The programmers describe the selection as 'surreal yet evocative', and keeping in line with the overarching theme of the festival, features acts of defiance and resistance in a world of control.
The final film of the Chronic Youth Film Festival, taking place in Cinema 1, is Seeking Mavis Beacon, directed by Jazmin Jones. It follows two teenagers who venture through the digital traces of the existence of Mavis Beacon, a fictional character created to sell a typing course in 1987, titled 'Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing'. The film is followed by a panel discussion on cyberfeminism, online communities and resistance. As a concluding film for the Chronic Youth Film Festival, journeying through the contemporary internet to find traces of a chronically online digital past is a successful final curtain for a bustling weekend of eclectic social and cinephilic activities.
Edited by Humaira Valera, co-film & TV editor
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