Illumina Digital premiéres first full-length feature film At Edinburgh International Film Festival

The first full length feature film from Bafta award-winning multi-media production company Illumina Digital receives its UK premiére at the Edinburgh International Film Festival later this month.
‘Bata-ville – we are not afraid of the future’ is a remarkable feature which follows 42 former employees of closed shoe factories in East Tilbury, Essex and Maryport, Cumbria on a coach trip across Europe to the origins of the Bata shoe empire in the Czech Republic.
Bata-ville stars writer and directors Karen Guthrie and Nina Pope as travel hostesses on a journey that sees their passengers reflect on their shared history and what the future holds for them back home.
It is a co-production between Illumina Digital, Somewhere and Commissions East. The Executive Producer is Andrew Chitty, Managing Director of Illumina Digital, who commented: ”Bata-ville – we are not afraid of the future is our first full-length feature film and it seems fitting that it will debut in Edinburgh. Nina and Karen share our passion for engaging audiences in interactive experience, be they online, on TV or live and combining the Illumina Digital creative team’s production expertise with Nina and Karen’s unique artistry has proven to be a very rewarding experience. The result it something very special – a tender film unlike anything else currently showing.”
Shoe entrepreneur Tomas Bata – the Henry Ford of Eastern Europe – was a visionary whose ambition that his employees “work collectively, live individually” inspired Czech architects to design a Utopian town to serve the needs of workers employed at the shoe factory at hits heart.
Bata’s town, Zlin, in the Czech Republic, expanded exponentially in the early 1930s from a small village to a town to be able to accommodate his burgeoning empire. This modernist prototype – with its shops, leisure facilities and homes – was replicated across the globe, including the small village of East Tilbury on the Thames Estuary, developed by Bata in 1932.
Inspired by the contrast between Bata’s idealism and the more recent industrial decline of East Tilbury and Maryport, Bata-ville sees artist film-makers Pope and Guthrie immerse their passengers in what begins as a free holiday, but soon becomes an opportunity for a collective imagining of what Bata’s maxim “We are not afraid of the future” means for them in the 21st century.
As well as writing and directing the film, Pope and Guthrie adopt on-screen personae to orchestrate events and interviews in this travelogue-cum-documentary artwork. Wearing distinctive costumes, they perform the role of travel hostesses throughout the film – a device that allows them to observe each passenger’s journey with poignant and unexpected results.
‘Bata-ville – we are not afraid of the future’ is screened as part of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF) at the Edinburgh Film House on Monday, August 22 at 1pm and Thursday, August 25 at 6pm.
(GB)