This year’s Oxford Green Week festival will launch its programme of events at a special film screening at the Ultimate Picture Palace.
The East Oxford cinema will screen ‘How to Let Go of the World and Love All Things Climate Can’t Change’ at 6pm on Tuesday 9 May.
Oxford Green Week, which takes place between 17 and 25 June, is a city-wide festival that uses culture, creativity and community to inspire local people to take action against climate change.
The festival was formerly known as Low Carbon Oxford Week.
The full programme will be announced at the film screening, but events already confirmed include:
- The Big Green Day Out launch event: a free, family-friendly event on Broad Street featuring arts and crafts, live entertainment, hands-on workshops and delicious local food and drink
- Test Drive the Future at Cherwell School: an opportunity to test drive a range of new electric and hydrogen fuelled cars for free and learn about the future of low carbon transport. Featuring guest speaker Robert Llewellyn from Red Dwarf and Scrapheap Challenge
- Over a dozen free ‘Green Behind the Scenes’ events: expert-led tours highlighting green features of Oxford colleges, Pegasus Theatre, Sheldonian Museum, John Radcliffe Hospital and many more
- The Big Green Treasure Hunt: a prize activity trail where you can discover hidden green highlights all across the city, with a chance to win the star prize of a Brompton bike if you visit five or more
‘How to Let Go of the World and Love All Things Climate Can’t Change’ is a new documentary from director Josh Fox.
The film acknowledges that it may be too late to stop some of the worst consequences of climate change and asks: ‘What is it that climate change can’t destroy? What is so deep within us that no calamity can take it away?’
The screening is also part of the UK Green Film Festival, a nationwide celebration of environmental films that takes place between 4 and 11 May.
Followed the screening, a special panel discussion will discuss their reactions to the film, explain how their projects help make Oxford a leading green city and how they will be celebrating during Oxford Green Week.
The panel will feature Peter Lefort from the Eden Project, Dot Tiwari from Abundance Oxford, Jenny Carr from Oxford City Council and Jamie Clarke from Climate Outreach.
Jenny Carr, Oxford City Council’s Oxford Green Week event organiser, said: “We are really excited about this year’s festival programme and can’t wait to start promoting it out to the general public.
“Our week-long festival is jam-packed with free, family-friendly events happening all over Oxford.
“We are thrilled that the Ultimate Picture Palace is helping us to launch the festival at this showing of what is a thought-provoking and inspiring new film.’
Becky Hallsmith, owner of the Ultimate Picture Palace, said: "We’re delighted to have this year’s Oxford Green Week launch event at our cinema.
“This year’s event is extra special as the documentary is also part of the national UK Green Film Festival programme, which we have been participating in since 2014.
“We always relish the opportunity to screen films and documentaries that focus on the challenges we face to make our cities and the world a bit greener."
Peter Lefort, Country Manager (England) at Eden Project Communities, said: “The themes in the film are a great way to raise awareness of how exceptional Oxford is as a home to so many environmental projects.
“At both an academic and community level, we are really lucky to have a huge number of ways to learn more and get involved every single day.
“I’m looking forward to a lively discussion between our panel and the audience on the importance of hope and celebration both here and across the world.”
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