The Manchester International Crime and Justice Film Festival 2024

Since 2019, Manchester Metropolitan University has been putting together a free film festival dedicated to providing an alternative take on crime, justice and punishment in the 21st century. Sponsored by the Department of Sociology and curated by staff from the university’s Policy Evaluation and Research Unit (PERU), the Manchester International Crime and Justice Film Festival uses cinema to ask questions and provoke debate about real life issues, and the way films mediate our perception of crime and justice.

This year’s festival features a real mix of titles, from serious minded docs and gritty thrillers, to cult comedies and Hollywood classics. Highlights include a screening of Edgar Wright’s Hot Fuzz alongside a free tour of the Police Museum, a showing of the original 1944 classic Gaslight followed by a discussion of the psychology behind the phenomenon of gaslighting, and a chance to catch up with Andrew Haigh’s overlooked coming-of-age western Lean on Pete.

Most of the films come accompanied with introductions, Q&As or discussions that provide added perspective on the films. There’s a partnership with French filmmaker Stéphane Roland whose film The Mutes’ Soliloquy, a shocking and heartfelt documentary interviewing survivors of the Indonesian massacres of 1965, will receive its UK premiere as part of the Festival. While to celebrate the university’s 200th anniversary, The Accused – the closing film to his year’s festival has been chosen by Lady Edwina Grosvenor, a criminologist, philanthropist and prison reformer.