Unfinished Sentences

This event is hosted by We Out Here (WOH)  a ground-breaking exhibition showcasing the work of six Black artists of Caribbean heritage based in Hastings. It is funded by Arts Council England. The exhibition is at Hastings Contemporary 1st April - 4th June 2023.

This event is FREE and includes a free cuppa - please book your free tickets with us in advance. The screening is followed by a short Q&A hosted by Rebecca with the film's director Mariel Brown. (The Q&A will be recorded live.)

Trinidadian poet and writer Wayne Brown uses words to bring his daughter into being. With a certainty like the knowledge of the next rising tide, Wayne declares to his wife, Megan, who has had many miscarriages and has no hope left, that, soon they will move to England and once there, she will get pregnant, and give birth to a healthy baby girl. Mariel is born out of words. However in spite of the mystical origin of their connection, as life unfolds and in much the same way as many daughters experience, Mariel’s love and adoration for her father become tinged by resentment and disappointment. Until it’s too late for words. Any words.
 
The magic incantations that brought Mariel to life, soon start to feel like a trap; as though the person she was meant to become was not to be of her own deciding. She is envious of her sister Saffrey’s apparent freedom and feels misunderstood by her mother – with whom she has lived since her parents’ divorce. When Mariel chooses a creative career, she begins shaking the foundations of her father’s pedestal – questioning him: why he hasn’t written and published more; or why in over 30 years, has he not finished a single major book? Has he been his own saboteur? Wayne has cast a long shadow over Mariel, but bringing him down to life size hurts him and in the end herself too.
 
In her 30s, Mariel starts seeing things differently and on Christmas Day she writes to him to apologize and forgive him for his many cruel words. A week later, he calls her from his home in Jamaica to say he has been diagnosed with stage four lung cancer.  By the next Christmas, Wayne is dead. Were the hurtful words exchanged an ominous spell, one that new words of forgiveness couldn’t undo?
 
After her father’s death, Mariel has an emotional breakdown, with acute anxiety – too many words could be heard, like a never-ending stream of consciousness. She can’t find the courage to read her father’s writing, and the sea, that watery ribbon by which she had always been tied to him, brings her no comfort.
 
Years later, Mariel goes sailing for the first time, thereby squarely confronting her sense of loss and moving on in the very waters and with the very words that brought them together. In carefully unraveling the threads of her father’s life, she discovers that his art transcends death and allows her to hear his voice again, and ultimately to find a way back to her own self.

Thursday 11am screenings only £5 and include a free cuppa!

About Mariel Brown (pictured):

Mariel Brown is a filmmaker, writer and publisher. She is the award-winning director of the creative and production companies SAVANT and SAVANT Films; co-founder and executive director of filmmakers’ collaborative, FILMCO; partner in the publishing company, Robert & Christopher Publishers. Her writing has appeared in Caribbean magazines including
Caribbean Beat.

About Rebecca E Marshall:

Rebecca E Marshall is the co-founder of The Electric Palace Cinema in Hastings.

She is a filmmaker and Doctor of Philosophy in Film by Practice. Her documentaries plunge into a space of deep looking, from swimming in the sea (Glitter and Storm) to her latest project The Forest in Me, an essay-film about people who are cut off from the world in extraordinary ways, and the connections that bind us all together. Rebecca is a visiting lecturer for the MA documentary department at The London Film School.

This film is F-Rated. The F-Rating is applied to all films which are directed by women and/or written by women. Find out more about F-Rating.

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