Sunday challenge to the mainstream

Its new programme continues that tradition with an impressive line-up of films and, as always, they challenge mainstream product and take up issues and themes ignored by the big cinema chains.

The co-op is supported by trade unions like Bectu, CWU, GMB, Unite and SERTUC as well as trades councils and South East Progressive Co-operators.

If you're at a loose end on a Sunday morning and feel the need for something more stimulating than the junk food of breakfast television, you could do much worse than giving one of the co-op's films at the Renoir cinema in Bloomsbury a try.

The 2010 programme kicked off with two films on the Middle East - Meeting Resistance To The Iraq War and Jenny Morgan's moving Waiting For Mordechai, a tribute to the brave Israeli nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu.

It continues on March 14 with a double bill on the Spanish civil war - The Brits Who Fought For Spain by Matt Richards and The Long Road To Spain by Dan Carrier.

They tell the story of the 2,500 British volunteers who travelled to Spain to fight for the Spanish Republic and were made for the 70th Anniversary of the end of the war when less than 20 of the volunteers were still alive.

When Laurie Lee wrote of trekking through the Pyrenees to fight Franco, he used his novelist's eye to recreate an experience that haunted him for the rest of his life. Carrier's great uncle Nat Cohen made the trip by bicycle.

Lee's recollections were challenged by those who were there, casting doubt on the veracity of the story told in his book A Moment of War. Carrier says he read hundreds of accounts of brave volunteers who gave up their lives in England and slipped south to the Iberian peninsula to offer support to the workers of Spain.

He often wondered what the journey would have been like, so decided to do it for himself.

He started his journey at the former headquarters of the Communist Party in Covent Garden where so many volunteers came to offer their lives for the cause. Following the many eye witness accounts left by volunteers, he trekked through the Pyrenees to the Spanish garrison town of Figueras, where new volunteers were recruited. The Long Road To Spain follows the odyssey those volunteers made to fight fascism.

Both films will be preceded by a 10-minute short Banking In The Shadows: A Visit To Jersey, an exposure of the island as a tax haven for the rich.

As is usual at the film co-op, you don't just get the film. Screenings are followed by a lively discussion, usually with the film-makers and those knowledgeable about the events or issues depicted.

Other must-see films programmed for future showings include American Sandinista by Jason Blalock which commemorates the US citizens who braved US-made bullets and bombs to help the Sandinistas in Nicaragua and To Play And To Struggle (Tocar y Luchar), the captivating story of El Sistema, the Venezuelan Youth Orchestra programme.

Also in the programme is Tower Colliery, a celebration of the miners' takeover of their pit after the momentous 1984 strike in opposition to Thatcher's closure plans.

Miners at Tower, under their charismatic union rep Tyrone O'Sullivan, decided to run it as a workers' co-operative.

Inspirational stuff and these are just a few of the rich programme of films from around the world that the London Socialist Film Co-op will be showing.

Try not to miss them, as you may not get an opportunity to see them anywhere else.

All screenings, on the second Sunday of every month, take place at the Renoir Cinema, Brunswick Square, London WC1 at 10.30am for 11am. Nearest tube: Russell Square.

For membership enquiries call (020)-7278 5764 or email nseyd@hotmail.com or visit the website www.socialistfilm.blogspot.com