1h 43min | Documentary | 2021 | PG
Dir. Jennifer Holness
Pre-show activities:
- Regent Park Catering Collective shares their delicious Butter Chicken recipe. You can follow along and make some of your own. Check out their Recipe HERE.
- Catch performances from the talented youth and team of Regent Park School of Music (RPSM).
- RBCxMusic will be presenting First Up, musical performances with featured artists: Aiza, Domanique Grant, Lu Kala, Töme!
Watch youth short films from SKETCH Working Arts’ Tiny Adaptations: Transformative Justice Frame by Frame series and the Toronto Ward Museum’s Block by Block project, before the film.
This event is FREE and takes place online. Subscribe for free access by filling out the red form on our homepage HERE. If you’ve already subscribed for a previous online event, you can watch the film from the time it goes live until Wednesday August 26th 2021, 11:59PM.
Under the Stars programming is geo-blocked to Canada. You must be within Canada to access the events.
Film Synopsis:
Subjects of Desire explores the cultural shift in North American beauty standards towards embracing Black female aesthetics and features while exposing the deliberate and often dangerous portrayals of Black women in the media. From society’s new fixation on the ‘booty’, fuller lips, the dramatic rise of spray tanned skin, ethnic hairstyles, and athletic bodies, some argue that Black women are having a beauty moment. But others, primarily Black women, argue that traditional Black features and attributes are seen as more desirable when they are on White women.
Told from the POV of women who aren’t afraid to challenge conventional beauty standards, the film is partially set at the 50th Anniversary of the Miss Black America Pageant, a beauty pageant that was created as a political protest.
Subjects of Desire is a culturally significant, provocative film that deconstructs what we understand about race and the power behind beauty.
About our pre-show programming:
Regent Park Catering Collective is a social enterprise of the Toronto Centre of Learning & Development that serves as a valuable platform to create jobs locally and help residents and newcomers thrive. The Regent Park Catering Collective comes together to create exciting dishes that are a fusion of our members’ heritages.
Regent Park School of Music (RPSM) is a community music school that gives 1,000 kids a year a rich and rewarding music education, by removing the financial obstacle. For over 20 years they have seen that the study of music allows young people to flourish creatively, personally and academically…enriching their lives and future prospects. Students have access to some of Toronto’s best music teachers and a vast array of musical instruments and options. They make music with fellow students, RPSM faculty and even the odd celebrity and perform all over the city.
Shorts :
Tiny Adaptations: Transformative Justice Frame by Frame is a series of short videos for social change produced by emerging filmmakers in the Transformation is Reel six month video arts residency hosted by SKETCH Working Arts. Facilitated by Jahmal Nugent & Naty Tremblay. Artists in residence were invited to explore through digital media what Transformative Justice means & could look like in these unprecedented times. The results are vulnerable, raw & visionary.
Block by Block is a participatory, multimedia program of the Toronto Ward Museum. We train young people to interview community members in their own neighbourhoods about their lived experiences of migration, settlement and civic life. Block by Block is thrilled to be working in Regent Park from 2019-2022 with support from the Regent Park Film Festival and Toronto Council Fire Native Cultural Centre and grateful to all of the Regent Park community members who have contributed so far.
Visit www.wardmuseum.ca or @TOWardMuseum on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Subscribe for FREE Access by filling out the big red subscription form on our Homepage HERE.
Once you’ve created your account, you can enjoy all our digital content at Watch.RegentParkFilmFestival.com.
Questions? Contact info@rpff.ca.