Free Film Screenings at Old Spitalfields Market as part of East End Film Festival

Free films for a good cause

By Andrew Simpson

Everybody loves an outdoor film screening. Well, as long as the weather is good! Having the advantage of being under a beautiful vaulted roof whilst still being open to the light and warmth of summer, the antique beauty of Old Spitalfields Market is the perfect venue for an early summer screening. Right in the centre of the bustle of East London, one can imagine just strolling in with a bottle of wine and a few friends, unrolling a blanket and settling in for the night.

All of which is just as well, really, as the East End Film Festival will be offering people the chance to do just that later this week, and for a good cause. An annual film and multimedia arts festival taking place across East London on every weekend in June – including an entire weekend of all singing, all dancing cinema in this beautiful Victorian space. And all for the price of a tin of beans.

The Films For Food Concept

Films for Food is a charitable initiative set up by East London filmmaker collective The Rainbow Collective in response to the growing need for food banks in London. Together, they screen films in venues around East London, often hosting special discussions around the political themes of the films being shown, and welcoming special guests. All screenings are free, with the price of entry being a donation of non-perishable food, collected at the screening and subsequently donated to Tower Hamlets Foodbank. Simple right? Great films, all supporting a great cause: helping society’s most vulnerable.

Get Your Shark On: The Films

All of the above sounds great of course, but the real question is what films are on offer? Luckily EEFF aren’t messing around. Opening on Friday 2 June with West Side Story, the festival will be screening one of the greatest musicals of all time, the one about New York, love, wanting to be in America, the Jets, and the Sharks. Nicely mirroring the tenant-like buildings surrounding the market, it’s a perfect setting for one of the most fun, catching, and romantic of classic Hollywood musicals. Don’t forget that blanket, and register for your free ticket here.

For the families out there (and carrying on the musical theme), on Saturday 3 June you can come and see iconic British children’s film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, complete with flying car and Child Catcher, another musical classic, again donating to the great cause that is Films for Food. There will also be a variety of films, from a special British youth programme, films about local East End history and cultures, and modern London portrait Circle/Line, screening throughout the day, all for free. The evening of Saturday 3 June also gives you the chance to grab a sofa and a bottle of bubbly for the UK’s first outdoor screening of La La Land. That last one costs money, but hey, you can’t have everything. And of you’ve already come along to West Side Story, you’ll have seen an amazing film under the stars, and done your bit.

For more information about East End Film Festival’s weekend of free outdoor screenings at Old Spitalfields Market, visit www.eastendfilmfestival.com