Amateur Events

London Bicycle Film Festival 2013 opens on Thursday October 3

Urban Birds is a short film about 4 female bicycle couriers in London: Emily, Apryl, Ale and Stephanie.

Millions of people move through London everyday. Thousands of them will be cyclists. Seven hundred or so of them will be bike messengers and in that select, unique grouping of birdlike creatures, flocking through the veins of our city – a couple of a dozen or so of these will be women. These “urban birds’ dart through the streets and alleys of the capital with one purpose: the deliverance of a package from one place to another. Yet contained in these singular flights, lie a myriad of journeys mostly unseen to the pedestrian eye of the city.

During one “drop”, she will move through an open and unlimited environment, unprotected by the walls and interior of an office; daily, she will choose to risk her life by weaving in an out of a matrix of constant motion and traffic, sensing the gaps in the flow, rushing through every needle’s eye, her primal fight/flight instincts being exercised more in the course of a day, than in one year of the average urbanite. She will spend up to eight hours in constant physical toil, while balancing a delicate mapping system in her mind, a system composed of streets, routes, shortcuts, thoughts, feelings, memories and experiences. All in about 20 minutes. All against the clock.

In this select tribe of primal hunter-gatherers, streaking through the streets in search of their prey – how do our “urban birds” find their place and why have they chosen to find it? Urban Birds will look at the journeys of 4 female couriers and using live action alongside animation, see what helps them to fly.

Other shorts in Program 5 – Urban Bike Shorts – on Saturday October 5 starting from 18:00 include;

Slaughterama 6, Portrait of a bike festival in Richmond, Virginia.
To see what you can do, A short documentary on a fashion designer and cyclist Nicole LaBrie as she competes in the Riverwest 24-hour bike race.
The Postman, Ride through the streets of Kabul, Afghanistan with Sayed Farouq Shah Sadat.
Ball Wednesday, A typical day in the life of a bike polo ball.
Jubal and Guillem, A heartfelt story about twin bothers – one who has one leg amputated – who both walk away BMX champions
Bike Polo Milano, A chronicle of the growth of the bike polo scene in Milan.
The Bicycle, An old, abandoned bicycle learns to love again.
The Cyclist, A love story that will send you spinning…
Redhook Crit, Day and night at the Redhook Crit 2013 race. Fixed gears, no brakes.
Road sage, Lucas Brunelle captures his worldwide bicycle adventures with his helmet camera.