Hi everyone

Over 30 new people have joined our email group in the past week.
This is a chance for our new subscribers to catch up with the
Festival.

Dont forget to reply to this email if you would like to go to our
Launch Party on Thursday 10th July. Details below.

I will be sending out an email this weekend with directions to the
Louise T Blouin Institute and will be replying to everyone who has
asked to be on our guest list.


Geoff


THE PORTOBELLO FILM FESTIVAL

The Portobello Film Festival started in 1996 as part of a wider arts
celebration in Kensington. The Arts Festival faded away however the
Film Festival kept going. It has become the largest celebration of
Independent Film in Europe. This September we will be holding our
13th Festival.

There are basically two rules that have guided the Festival from its
conception.

1) Every film that is submitted is scheduled.
2) There are no admission charges to any event.


THE EMAIL LIST

Just over five years ago this email list was started to enable the
group of Portobello Film Festival regulars to stay in touch with the
Festival, find out where and when the shows were being held and be
informed about any last minute changes.

We now have over 1,200 email subscribers and we think this is the
biggest UK group of its type. Outside the main Festival period
subscribers generally get around two emails a month. During the two
weeks of the Festival period there is generally an email sent every
other day.

Being a subscriber to this list means that you get to find out what
is happening before anyone else. You also get invited to events where
a limit is placed on admissions. Generally these are the Launch
Parties and Award Ceremonies. This email contains an invite to the
launch for the 2008 Festival.

The list of subscribers is never sent to third parties or other
organisations. Sometimes we send an email on behalf of someone who
has a connection to the Festival.


2008 HIGHLIGHTS

Portobello Film Festival 2008 (28 August – 14 September)

Portobello Film Festival 2008 premieres over 700 new films -
features, shorts, documentaries, music films and animation – from
all over the world with a carnivalist, urban, underground spin at
splendid new venue The Tabernacle, Powis Square, W11 from 28 August
to 14 September. Entry to all events is free.

Highlights
At The Tabernacle, Powis Square, W11

28 August. Grand Opening Gala featuring UK Premieres of top fashion
photographer Ben Charles Edwards musical The Town That Boars Me
featuring Sadie Frost and Kelly Osbourne, & The Wackness – winner of
audience award at Sundance 2008 with Ben Kingsley.

30 August. Andrew Logan presents a complete history of Alternative
Miss World featuring Divine, John Maybury, Derek Jarman and Leigh
Bowery.

31 August. Sandy Leiberson, Molly Parkin and Robert Chilcott in
Unsung Heroes, a panel discussion and Q&A about the essential but
neglected art of writing screenplays, followed by Performance (set in
Powis Square and produced by Sandy Leiberson).

6 September. A Moment In History, films and talks by Colin Prescod
and Menelik Shabazz, on Ladbroke Grove Caribbean culture, remembering
the 50th anniversary of the Notting Hill Race Riots.

11 September. Youth Culture TV introduce an evening of films by local
youth.

12 September. Dutch VJ/AV artist Arno Coenen presents state of the
art digital images and music.

13 September. World Premiere of Curry and Crime, featuring players
from Bend It Like Beckham.

14 September. Closing Ceremony with Awards for best films submitted
for Portobello 2008.

Also screening unseen films about Baaba Maal from Chris Saleswicz,
Moroccan and Sufi films from Artversa, new musical Brown Punk from
Tricky, comedy from Black Eye, & a Nollywood showcase.

Plus Urban art from

Snug – creator of the spectacular Kilburn Tube Station mural, Inkie -
long time Bristolian cohort of Bansky, and Zeus, whose work is now
being sold at establishment auction houses are prime movers in the
Street Art phenomenon.

Nick Reynolds is sculpting a special show based the Mexican Day Of
The Dead. We are showing the premiere of the Punkvert film about
John Joe Amador recently executed in US.

Joe Rush makes futuristic, hallucinatory sculptures out of scrap
metal. He is currently being patronised by Damien Hirst and is
responsible for the Trash City field at the Glastonbury Festival.

Charlie Phillips displays photographs of Caribbean funerals from the
60s to the present day in Kensal Green Cemetery, North Kensington.

Special Show 7 September. Roots Time, in association with Black Film
Makers, at the ICA.

At the Inn On The Green, Thorpe Close, W10

Free comedy, music and theatre evenings throughout the Festival.

Art at the Muse Gallery, Portobello Road, W11 from Andrew Logan,
Dougie Fields, plus photos of the first ever Sex Pistols show by
Jenny Runacre.



INVITATION TO THE LAUNCH PARTY

You are invited to our Launch Party for the 2008 Portobello Film
Festival from 7pm to 11pm on July 10 at the Louise T Blouin
Institute, Olaf Street, Notting Dale, W11.

The Theme:

It Happened Here.
Portobello Film Festival distills the essence of The Grove.

(1st Floor)art from Mutoid Waste Company, Inkie and Zeus, VJing from
Red Dog and old school reggae from Lepke and Dread Broadcasting
Corporation

(2nd Floor) Previews of films from Portobello Film Festival 2008
including Brown Punk by Tricky and The Town That Boars Me by Ben
Charles Edwards.

(3rd Floor) Roughler TV live

The event is open to email subscribers, friends of subscribers and
invitees. It is guest list only and not open to the general public.

If you would like to be on the guestlist for our Launch Party please
reply to this email.

If you are going to attend in one group then I just need the
subscribers name with a plus number eg Fred Smith plus two. If people
are going separately, I need the name of one person in each group eg
Fred Smith plus two; Jane Jones plus three.

Closing date for the guest list will be July 8.