Fair Frome will be showing ‘The Divide’ film at Frome Assembly Rooms on Sunday 24th April with doors open at 7.00pm.
Originally scheduled for the Westway Cinema, the Assembly Rooms and Frome Film and Video Makers club have stepped in to help with the showing of the film. The film, which runs for an hour and a quarter, will be followed by a panel discussion and Q&A on the issues the film raises, featuring local political and church representatives. Entry is £5.00 with concessions free of charge.
‘The Divide’ is inspired by the critically-acclaimed, best-selling book ‘The Spirit Level’ by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. ‘The Divide’ tells the story of seven individuals striving for a better life in modern day USA and UK – where the top 0.1% owns as much wealth as the bottom 90%.
By plotting these tales together, the film uncovers how virtually every aspect of our lives is controlled by one factor: the size of the gap between rich and poor. This isn’t based on real life, this is real life.
Featured in ‘The Divide’: Wall Street psychologist Alden wants to make it to the top 1%; Glaswegian rapper Darren just wants to stay sober; Newcastle carer Rochelle wishes her job wasn’t looked down on so much; Jen in Sacramento, California, doesn’t even talk to the neighbours in her upscale gated community – they’ve made it clear to her she isn’t “their kind”.
It becomes clear that a higher income doesn’t ensure happiness and inequality hurts everyone – rich and poor. ‘The Divide’ also features high profile commentators including former economic adviser to Margaret Thatcher, Sir Alan Budd, historian Sir Max Hastings, economist Ha-Joon Chang, Noam Chomsky and epidemiologist Sir Michael Marmot.
By weaving these stories with news archive from 1979 to the present day, ‘The Divide’ creates a lyrical, psychological and tragi-comic picture of how economic division creates social division.
Bob Ashford Chair of Fair Frome says, “Fair Frome was established to provide help and support to people experiencing financial crisis and to raise debates about the causes of poverty and inequality. This film and the panel discussion which follows will offer an important opportunity to discuss issues which are just as relevant in Frome as they are in the inner city.”
