Youth Engagement at the Glasgow Film Theatre

In preparation for a potential future article I met with and interviewed two members of staff from The Glasgow Film Theatre (The GFT): Lindsay Clydesdale, Marketing Manager and Rebecca McSheaffrey, Children and Young People Coordinator. The transcript of the interview, which took place late last year (17 October 2019) appears below. 



What do you do at the Glasgow Film Theatre? 


Lindsay: My name is Lindsay and I am the Marketing Manager. I look after all aspects of marketing for The GFT along with the film festivals we run, which are the Glasgow Film Festival and Glasgow Youth Film Festival. In terms of marketing, this covers dealings with the media, advertising, our website and social media and any printed materials we produce, like brochures, flyers or leaflets – so, it’s quite a varied role. 


Rebecca: I’m Becca, I’m the Children and Young People Coordinator. I look after our Children and Youth Programme, which ranges from wee five-year olds all the way up to the age of 25. And within that we’ve got various different programmes; we have our Take 2 programme, our Children and Families programme, and we do a whole host of school activities, from nursery right through to the end of secondary school. We also have the Glasgow Youth Film Festival which we host each year, that’s when 15 young people curate their very own film festival. We also provide monthly youth screenings and a discount card for 15-25 year olds. And we’ve just launched a new Youth Board panel who will work alongside Glasgow Film throughout the year to make sure that what we’re doing is relevant for young people. Keep me in check, really… because I’m not that young anymore. So, they need to tell me what’s relevant. It’s a really big role and one of the main focuses is the Glasgow Youth Film Festival – that’s where I work most closely with Lindsay.

Lindsay Clydesdale, Marketing Manager (left) and Rebecca McSheaffrey, Children and Young People Coordinator (right).

What does The Glasgow Film Theatre do for the teenage audience?

Lindsay: There’s quite a few things that we do that target a teenage audience, but obviously teenagers vary greatly - there’s quite a big difference between a 13 year old and a 19 year old. 


Rebecca: Generally, the 12-15 year old audience is a very difficult age bracket for us. The reason being that our Children and Families programme doesn’t have an upper age limit. Usually young people, by the time they start getting to 11 or 12, they’re maybe a bit over coming to the cinema with their mum or dad. Maybe they only want to come and see one specific film, like when we had Spiderman: Homecoming on, loads of 12-15 year olds came and saw Spiderman: Homecoming with their parents – because it’s a free film and it’s a Saturday. But bear in mind that the programme has to cater for children from five up to that age, so it doesn’t mean that there is always a film suitable for the age bracket you’re looking at specifically. Then the difficulty is, a lot of programmes we offer start at the age 15 – the reason is the majority of films we show at the cinema are awarded certificate 15 by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), which means we would be in violation of the law if we allowed anyone under the age of 15 to see that film. So that does means it falls into a bit of a tricky age range for us, but we do try to make sure that were conscious of the 12-15 age range. A good example of this, is the Glasgow Youth Film Festival. All of the young people that manage this programme are 15 and over because they have to be able to watch the certificate 15 films. However, what we do is remind them that they’re putting on a festival for everybody of all ages, and they have to be mindful of the fact that if they choose a certificate 15 film, they might be preventing some younger audiences from attending the film festival. The closing gala this year we showed Scott Pilgrim vs The World, which was a 12A. We did have some certificate 15 options on the table but the panel really liked a couple of different films and in the end, Scott Pilgrim vs The World was selected. The fact that the film was a 12A meant that a younger audience could come and see it. The panel understood for the benefit of their festival they would rather have younger people in the cinema, they made their decision partly based on that. And also, the fact that Scott Pilgrim vs The World is a good movie!


In terms of specific outreach events, the 12-15 year old audience is a difficult group for us to get access to because we’re often limited by films that are available to us and where these films fit within the programme. But we’re not unique in this. Quite often when I’m doing presentations and I’m speak with potential funders about helping to support our education programmes [because we’re a registered charity] I often talk about how cinema is a really safe space. Generally young people will have come to the cinema when they were young, with their families – they would know the cinema, they would know the space. When they start hitting that 12-15 year old age range – where they might be want to start going out on their own, without mum and dad – generally the cinema is one of the first places they go. Because there’s a defined start time to the film, the parents know that there’s going to be responsible staff there, they know it’s not an alcohol driven environment (although alcohol is available), and also there’s a clear end time as well. It means that often people, parents and guardians are quite comfortable letting young people explore the cinema on their own and start coming on their own. Having said that though it is often very dependent on the films that are available, because The GFT is independent we offer a bit more of a selection, more European films for example, more films that might not otherwise get shown elsewhere.



Do you help people to make their own movies and then show them at The GFT?


Rebecca: Yes, we do a really big mix. One of the things we do with Glasgow Youth Film Festival is a Shorts programme. In previous years, an open call for submissions meant that the Shorts programme was open to anybody in the world. Contributors don’t need to have a big budget or universal tagline, they can just be young people with an iPhone that have made a film. In past years we’ve ended up with films that are of incredibly high quality, but that there not necessarily for, or made by, young people. So, what we did this year was that we insisted that if you were going to submit a film to the Glasgow Youth Film Festival, then you had to be under the age of 30, or your film had to be aimed at people under the age of 30. And the really nice thing was that it meant that a lot of the surrounding colleges could make their own films. Obviously, these students are older than 15, but they’re still quite young in terms of film-making – 18 or 19 year olds mainly. They borrowed camera equipment from their college and went out and made their own film. As a lot of these submitted films aren’t certified, I have to watch them first to make sure they’re appropriate for the younger audience. There were a quite few films I decided if the BBFC watched them, they would maybe struggle getting a 15 certificate. I removed all those ones and then I showed the others that were appropriate to members of the Youth Panel. And from that pool, they selected the final programme. In a lot of ways, there are opportunities in little pockets throughout the Glasgow Film programme where independent film-makers and young film-makers can show their work. We just have to be extra careful that it is appropriate for those audiences.


Lindsay: And also because a lot of the films we show at the beginning of their run or as previews, quite often these films haven’t necessarily been certificated yet - especially at the time of film festivals, where you show a lot of films for the first time. 


There are a lot of different things competing for the interests of the target group and we’re trying to make sure they’re catered for. One of the great things Rebecca does is speaking with young people and teenagers, because we can’t get it right unless we make it sure that they’re interested in the offering and it’s what they want.



What is the difference between arthouse and independent?


Lindsay: Really, ‘independent’ is when you’re talking about a smaller film company independent of all the major studios, whereas I feel that ‘arthouse’ is more of a label that people put on certain cinemas and films - a specific type of film, not like your big studio blockbusters.


In terms of our cinema here, they often fall under the same category. A lot of our films are what you would call arthouse, but the vast majority are independent. There’s very small number of cases where we will show what would be deemed to be a blockbuster. For example, we're showing, Joker next month, a month after its been given its general release. But we’re showing it on 70mm film, so that is aimed at people who love seeing films on film, rather than digital format. At the moment, we’ve got a Cinemasters season of Quentin Tarantino’s films, and were showing four out of the five films on film rather than digital. There are blurred lines – because you wouldn’t necessarily see Quentin Tarantino as arthouse as he’s still quite mainstream, but he still has that sort of independent vibe in the way he makes films and the themes of his films.


Rebecca: And that’s quite interesting as well, because our Take 2 programme is free a lot of children, young people and families, who maybe don’t have a lot of income come to our cinema and are able to see a film for free. It’s a nice Saturday activity that they can do together, and affordable – because sometimes going to the cinema can be quite expensive. When I’m selecting those films and when I’m sitting with our team discussing those films, sometimes I like to show blockbusters that are out or have been out recently. Generally, the first Saturday of each month we tend to show the big Disney film that is out on release, such as The Lion King or Aladdin, and these are not films we would typically show in the rest of the main programme. For me, it’s important that we know who’s coming to see us and what they’d like to see. But we also appreciate that a lot of families who come to Take 2 come because they love cinema. They want to share that passion with their children, so maybe sometimes we’ll put on an older film, that maybe a parent or guardian might have watched and they will want to bring their child to share that experience. Or sometimes, we want to challenge our Take 2 audiences, give them a bit of film history or film knowledge of their own – so a few months ago, we showed Roald Dahl’s The Witches. A title that in a lot of ways isn’t a mainstream film; it’s very old, and even although its old, it is quite niche in that it’s almost like a scary movie for children. We try as best we can to put a mix on in that programme and as I said, we recognise that the 12-15 year old market is sometimes a little bit difficult to programme for. So, we’ll offer films like Spiderman: Homecoming and Captain Marvel. We’ll occasionally put something like that in so that there’s a good diversity in the programme and that families with children of all ages can come and enjoy it as well. But it’s tricky because you wouldn’t want to put that on all the time.


Lindsay: We have to be offering something different to multiplexes like Cineworld or Vue, otherwise we're not really doing what we’re here to do – which is to offer an effective choice. A lot of what we do is about encouraging to people to come more often [The GFT show something like 700-800 films each year], so there’s a huge variety of titles. One of the great things about being your age is you’re still finding out all the things you might love you – you might love animation, you might love French cinema or you might love film festivals, whatever. Our aim is getting people to come and try some of the different selection here, and that definitely stands for the Take 2 films as well, you will see different kinds of films across the month. 


Rebecca: We do anime, we do French films, we do live action, old 80’s classics, forgotten films of the 90’s – we do a really big mix within that programme as well. 


And that’s the same for our Schools programme because that’s generally where our 12-15 year olds are introduced to The GFT. They’re coming through school, and again, I apply the same ethos to choose our Schools programme. There are a lot of educational films in the programme, because teachers will want to bring pupils for an experience of learning, but also sometimes teachers appreciate that cinema can be a useful reward. Cinema can be something to enjoy – if a class has worked really hard on a project then they can come and reward them. Or, you know, maybe the class hasn’t been getting along that well and the teacher wants to bring them to the cinema as a bit of a bonding exercise. So, even with the Schools programme there is a lot of educational offers, a lot of documentaries and a lot of STEM-related films, but last year we showed Big Hero 6. We did lots of science activities around the film and we showed another film to the 12-15 year olds called Science Fair, which is a great documentary. But we also put on a bit of a mix – we had Incredibles 2, we had a couple of other fun movies…Isle of Dogs, purely fun, for the pure enjoyment of watching a film, type cinema. So it’s always trying to keep that balance. Truly it’s making sure that we are aware of all the different little pockets of our audience and trying to put on a menu that they can choose from.



I would love to see older mainstream movies on the big screen for the first time. Is it too costly to play these movies? Movies like Jaws, Forest Gump or Raiders of the Lost Ark?


Lindsay: Well, we just had Raiders of the Lost Ark on. We showed the trilogy – we didn’t do the fourth one. So during the summer, because fewer films are released at that time of year, we have the opportunity to put on classic films, and funnily enough Jaws, the original and the first three Indiana Jones films we screened over the summer.


Rebecca: That was actually a programme – myself and my boss worked on together – and the idea behind it was Our Movie Childhood. The idea was exactly what you said, about giving young people the opportunity to see films on the big screen for the very first time. The idea that a lot of these films were important to an older generation and would have shaped their childhood as well. So maybe they might want to come together with others or, as you say, people might just want to enjoy it, see it for the first time on the big screen. In terms of expense, these films are not expensive per se – we can afford to do it – it’s more about the timing and the programme. Between now and February or March, its awards season, so a lot of studios are putting out their really big films and everybody wants to go and see them. In February, we have our own Film Festival, so a lot of the cinema gets used for that and shows a whole variety of different films. But during the summer that is a really nice pocket of time where we can do that. Keep an eye on next year! They were quite successful those screenings, as well.


Lindsay: They did. I would have liked to go and see Jaws on the big screen, but I wasn’t brave enough. I was quite surprised that it was a 12A. I remember at the time thinking back to watching Jaws on the television, thinking it would be a 15 or an 18 certificate. I guess, because you maybe don’t see that much?


Rebecca: And also, The Goonies, The Goonies is a 12. And that was another interesting thing as well, the 12A certificate was only brought out in 2002. If a film was made before 2002 it will have been given a certificate 12, and that was a hard 12 – meaning you must be over the age of 12 to go and see it. But from 2002 onwards film could be awarded a 12A, which meant you could see the film if you were under 12 but you had to have an adult with you. So, if there’s been an old film released before 2002 it might not be correctly certified for today’s audiences, so the film would have to be re-released and the BBFC would need to re-rate the film as a 12A. For example, with The Goonies, I really wanted to show The Goonies in the first six months of my job, but I had to wait until the film passed its anniversary because then the studio re-released it, the BBFC re-rated it and then we could screen it. That’s the tricky thing regarding the 12A certificate in relation to older films. Sometimes we just have to make sure it is suitable for modern audiences under the right the certificate. Because I thought, in my head, The Goonies would get a PG, but it came out 12A. Sometimes you get it wrong.


Lindsay: No-one would believe you if you said The Goonies and Jaws have the same certificate. But they do.


Rebecca: And that is another thing about the 15 certificate. I know this isn’t strictly your audience, but it’s really interesting because a lot of my job is programming for young people who are going to run a festival and you’ll see that the majority of films are 15 certificate, but the range within that – some films can be a very soft 15 certificate and some can be at the upper end of that limit. So if I’m showing that kind of film, I have to consider quite carefully who I’m showing it to. Why are we putting it on? Especially when you’re working with younger audiences because you’re inviting them in to see that film.


Some studios will literally read the BBFC guidelines in order to see what they can get away with, and then make it hit that threshold. They’ll have legal people on set who are advising them on how to hit that threshold, because they want that 15 certificate – an 18 rating would cut off a lot of their audience. 


Lindsay: The Indiana Jones trilogy was all in one day as well, and there was a really good ticket price on it – I think it was all three films for £10 or something, all in Cinema 1 which is our largest screen. We showed the three films in one day – I think it was on a Bank Holiday in July or August, something like that – with half hour breaks in between. But they’ll be other events like that – sign up for the newsletter or follow us on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, whatever you use. Because we do still put out a monthly brochure and there’s obviously a lot of information in that, but you’ll always find the most up to date information on our website and on our social media.


Rebecca: Once you’re fifteen you can sign up for our free monthly youth screenings – the last Monday of every month – where we put out a free film that is meant to be a bit more challenging for our youth audiences. We put on a whole range of films and what’s really exciting is that our Youth Board are now going to be in charge of selecting those films as well, obviously with our support. The first film that they’ve chosen actually is a PG; it’s a documentary on the environment, but it’s quite upbeat, it’s called 2040. They chose this film because they wanted to attract a younger audience. They said it was important to them that a whole range of ages get to see this film. But generally, it is mostly 15 certificates that we show. But that was kind of a nice way to test out some different films for free, put on a whole different programme. The other thing is during the Glasgow Youth Film Festival – which post-15 year olds can also sign up for – the Youth Board pick a mix of new and older films. This year you got The Farewell – fresh out the box that week – but then we had Scott Pilgrim vs The World, and they chose Scott Pilgrim vs The World partly because the 12A certificate. It opened up the audience. But Scott Pilgrim vs The World was made about ten years ago, and a lot of our young people first watched that movie when they were 10, 11, and 12 and they said it was a really important film for them. It made them fall in love with what film could be. But they also showed a couple of another films…they picked Coraline for Take 2, and again that’s another film that’s about ten years old and they watched when they were younger and wanted to show others, more families. They also chose Fantastic Mr. Fox as well. Another example of an old film for you. The films from your childhood will in time be an old film to new younger audiences. It’s quite interesting how it moves on.


Lindsay: You just reminded me on the back of that, there were two great workshops as well. Because I think that the provision for young audiences here, its not just about showing them great films, its about helping them get into the industry if they want to, so there was a workshop with BAFTA and…


Rebecca: The group chose the themes of the topic, very specific – a female, Scottish director on her first feature film, and we managed to find Marion Edmunds. So she did a whole hour discussion on her feature film. She basically broke down what it was like to be a director on a film, what was the reality of it. We also did a panel discussion on finding your feet in the film industry and again, the group said that basically a lot of the time they go to careers events its people at the very top of their career, which is great and very inspiring. But in terms of practical information not always that helpful because maybe they’ve been in the job for 10-15 years, and actually getting in and getting started has changed so much. We had five panellists under the age of 30 who were in their first or second job in the film industry (maybe working there for about four or five years), so they were giving advice and that was what the group wanted. They wanted to hear from younger people.


Lindsay: Giving them that sort of access, it’s good.


Rebecca: We also do look at the different ways people can engage with films. Obviously, there’s watching film, but the group also wrote reviews for all the films, and they were published in The Skinny, so if you enjoy writing about film there was a big element of that in this programme. There was the workshops as well, they also hosted Q&A’s with the actors and directors, and they introduced all the films. Some of the introductions were quite personal, like one or two of the films really resonated with them and they wanted to share that. Some of the introductions were more this film represents a certain sector of the film industry or represents a certain piece of film history, and it was maybe a bit more researched or more academic. It’s about just giving them some space to let them figure out what they would like to do with it as well.



And finally, what’s your favourite movie?


Lindsay: I got asked that at my job interview for here. And you know – bear in mind it’s The GFT – totally, put me on the spot…and I just went Predator. It’s the most un-GFT film I can imagine, but I do love it! I love All About Eve, which we showed a few months ago, but I do love proper old 80’s gruesome action films.


Rebecca: See I panicked that they might ask me that, I came up with a list of films that I thought would sound really cool. But then they didn’t ask me! 


I’m really lucky in my job in that I actually grew up in the hey-day of Disney, and that was really influential for me. So I’m living my dream every day. In my own life, I probably wouldn’t watch anything over a certificate 15 anyway, so I didn’t go and see Quentin Tarantino season. 


I think my favourite film to put on a lazy Sunday afternoon is Clue, with Tim Curry. It’s based on the board game, Cluedo. It’s a bit of a comedy, whodunnit caper, they’re all running around this big mansion.  I just love it because every time I watch it, I think Tim Curry is so funny and I always pick up on a different part of it. 


Massive thanks to Lindsay and Rebecca for taking the time to speak with me.