DIRECTOR TO SCREEN FILM AT TARTAN WEEK
AN award winning film-maker from Gourock is taking her emotional documentary about the independence referendum all the way to New York.
Fresh from featuring in the Inverclyde Film Festival, Jane McAllister is now going to screen ‘To See Ourselves’ at the worldfamous Tartan Week.
Ten years on from an event which shook Scotland, her film is a deeply personal look back on the journey she took with her activist father during the summer of 2014.
At the time she was pregnant and took the chance to tell the story of Scotland during a moment in time.
Jane said: “I have had a great response on tour around Scotland and it stirs a lot of memories for people.
“When you watch it back it is deeply cathartic, reliving it after ten years had passed. It was like history being made in front of your eyes.
“There was a romanticism and a hope, and a sadness as well. The film was about a social revival.
“I have such gratitude that I had a chance to film it, to tell the story from both sides.
“It was about politics and the passion that comes with it. But it was also about family and community. It gave so many people a sense of belonging.
“There were a lot of emotions in there but there were so many positives at that time.
“My dad has been an activist his whole life, we were always at marches as children.
“It was like a re-awakening, there was so much passion and storytelling.
“I was pregnant at the time and
my child is now ten. It was very emotional to look back on after ten years.”
Jane decided to make a film after attending a meeting of activists with her father.
Since its release critics have poured praise on the film, with one calling it a love letter to her father and her unborn child.
Jane, who has made a number of films, moved to Gourock in 2016 with her husband David Watson, cabinet maker.
They run an art workspace in
Greenock and are also refurbishing a derelict church.
Jane added: “It took me all this time to put it together because there were just hundreds and hundreds of hours of footage and life gets in the road.”
To See Ourselves was the first film produced in Inverclyde to be screened at the local festival at the Waterfront Cinema, with a question and answer session afterwards.
Festival organiser Carys Knox said: “It was wonderful to have
a film like To See Ourselves at the festival and to have Jane involved.”
Jane, who studied at the Edinburgh College of Art, has previously won awards at independent festivals for her film Caretaker for the Lord and was commissioned by the BBC for her work.
Now she is looking forward to her transatlantic trip.
She said: “It is very exciting to be going to New York and I am really looking forward to it.”