Daniel Edelstyn and Hilary Powell’s documentary BANK JOB chronicles a vital and important movement to expose and eliminate debt. World premiere at Canada’s 2021 HOT DOCS festival comes during the devastating fiscal disaster of a global pandemic.
Artist-activists, filmmakers and heroic changemakers, inspired by international movement Strike Debt set about to create an art movement/project pushing for a national debt write-off as part of a reset for a fairer economic system. This culminates first with a book, and now a mischievous documentary film showing their journey with BANK JOB, set to World premiere at the globally renowned Hot Docs International Documentary Festival from April 29th -May 9th. The film will be available virtually across Canada during the festival, to be followed by a cinema release in the UK and the rest of the World.
What is BANK JOB??
An unlikely team, seemingly insurmountable odds, even explosions… taking heart warming, humorous and daring steps towards a future in which money works for us all. BANK JOB is a feature film and art project pushing for a national debt write-off as part of a reset for a fairer economic system.
A seat of your pants drama taking you into the heart of our financial system: how money is created as debt. The film explores the political power relationships dictated by the power of money creation and looks for alternatives in a playful, warm and dramatic way. Can they blow up £1.2m of high interest debt without losing their sanity and sacrificing their relationship?
Filmmaker Dan Edelstyn explains: “Throughout 2018/19 we operated out of a former Bank on a High Street in Walthamstow, North East London as HSCB (Hoe Street Central Bank). The Guardian called us “The Rebel Bank” – as we first printed our own banknotes/artwork and sold £40,000 worth of them. We used 50% of the proceeds to fund local projects picking up the pieces of our broken financial system – local food bank Eat or Heat, homeless kitchen Pl84U-Al Suffa, youth project The Soul Project and Barn Croft Primary School.”
Director Hilary Powell adds: “We used the other £20,000 to buy up and abolish £1.2m of local high interest debt. Debt gets sold for a fraction of its face value when debtors fail to make repayments. Debts get sold on and on – but debtors get chased for the full amount.”
With the planet at the precipice of a never before encountered financial catastrophe, BANK JOB’s release could not be more timely as a tool, inspiration and part of an international movement to help eradicate global debt and put power back into the hands of the people using creativity, ingenuity and passion.
Visit https://www.hotdocs.ca for information on the premiere, and for a more detailed understanding of the BANK JOB movement and how to possibly get involved visit https://bankjob.pictures.
