WHITE RIOT

This documentary film charts a vital London protest movement. Rock Against Racism (RAR) was formed in 1976, prompted by 'music's biggest colonialist' Eric Clapton and his support of racist MP Enoch Powell. White Riot blends fresh interviews with queasy archive footage to recreate a hostile environment of anti-immigrant hysteria. The campaign grew to 1978's huge antifascist carnival in Victoria Park, featuring X-Ray Spex, Steel Pulse and of course The Clash, whose rock star charisma and gale-force conviction took RAR's message to the masses.

Rubika Shah is a British director whose films have screened at festivals including Sundance, Berlin, Tribeca, Hot Docs, BFI London and Sheffield Doc/Fest, amongst others. After working at Universal Music, she went on to become a freelance video journalist for ABC and BBC. Her first theatrical mini-documentary About David Bowie and MTV was shortlisted for a Grierson Award and screened across the UK. Shah has directed a number of documentary shorts for the BBC, which explore the works of Spike Lee, Gore Vidal and others. Her feature documentary White Riot is the winner of the London Film Festival Grierson Award 2019.