The best way to win an Oscar, so movie pundits and history indicate, is to play a character with a disability. Think Dustin Hoffman in Rainman, Daniel Day Lewis in My Left Foot and Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind. It’s a truth that irritates London Disability Arts Forum (LDAF) Director, Julie McNamara, and worked as a driver towards the establishment of the organisation’s annual Disability Film Festival, to be held for the fifth time, on June 5 to 8, at the National Film Theatre.
According to McNamara, the distorted portrayal of disabled people on-screen was one of the main reasons for creating a Disability Film Festival in London. Established in collaboration with LDAF Film and New Media Development Worker, Caglar Kimyoncu, McNamara says the festival gives LDAF an opportunity to ‘counter-balance the representation of disabled people by non-disabled people’ and to provide a platform for disabled film-makers.