The film ‘Then. Now. Forever’ from The London Taxi Drivers Charity for Children (LTCFC) won the coveted Piccadilly Lights Spotlight Prize (PLSP), at the 2024 Big Syn International Film Festival Awards- the world’s biggest sustainability film festival, on Friday 8th Nov, in a gala awards ceremony at Curzon Soho in London. The festival has been promoted by the Mayor of London, United Nations, British Council and led by celebrated sustainability leaders and OSCAR and BAFTA winning celebrities.
The winning film portrays the work of the charity with special needs and disadvantaged children since the 1940s till date. The film was screened at the iconic Piccadilly Lights-Europe’s biggest screen, on 14th Nov, to the roaring support and cheers of scores of hundreds of onlookers, filmmakers and their supporters at Piccadilly Circus. LTCFC was founded in 1928 and is dedicated to supporting special needs and disadvantaged children through annual outings, events, and fundraising efforts, with Queen Camilla as their royal patron.
The Big Syn International Film Festival is the world’s biggest sustainability film festival, reaching over 50 million in 120 countries, inspiring them to act on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) and make positive changes for the environment, society and economy. As part of the festival and awards, the PLSP spotlights what truly matters, for the greater good of society, and the prize includes screening of the winning film on Europe’s biggest screen, London’s iconic Piccadilly Lights. The PLSP jury were delighted to celebrate LTCFC’s work of helping special needs and disadvantaged children, for almost a century.
Winning films from other charities who grabbed the top spots are MIND, Jigsaw4U, WaterAid, Just a Drop, OneKind, Magpie Dance, icandance, St Giles Trust, CW+ (Charity of Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust), Jazzanne Arts, Winston’s Wish, MCC Foundation and RefYouMe.
Films of inclusion and diversity that won at the awards, range from Oscar winning legendary British actor Sir Ian McKellen’s and Drag Race Star Divina De Campo’s film Drag Fox, to films from marginalised filmmakers such as Chai-Coffi to PINK from LGBTQIA+ filmmaker – a bank robber’s son turned award-winning filmmaker. Whereas stories of resilience and hope also wowed the audience with Alex Lewis Mountain- the story of quadruple amputee Alex Lewis climbing Ethiopia’s highest mountain using a solar powered hand-cycle to a disabled cast and crew film, Teardrops from A Clown.
The founders of the festival, Dr Ragini G Roy and Dr Sourav Roy remarked, “It is humbling to see how the festival has evolved to become a global movement and we as advocates of sustainability, call upon global citizens to be inspired from these films of change and hope, to combat major issues such climate change, inequality, discrimination, poverty and many more, to secure their very own future and those of their loved ones.”
BSIFF24 Grand Jury comprised of OSCAR, BAFTA and EMMY award-winners and leaders from the sustainability, business, media and policy such as Roberta Boscolo (WMO, Climate and Energy Lead, United Nations), Baroness Bennett (House of Lords), Prof. Ioannis Ioannou (London Business School’s Sustainability Guru), Christine Choi (Professor, Tisch School of the Arts, New York University), Peggy Rajski (Oscar-winning filmmaker), Elena Andreicheva (OSCAR and BAFTA award-winning filmmaker), Martina Amati (BAFTA award-winning filmmaker), Steve Smith (BAFTA award-winning Director), and Alex Lockwood (BAFTA award-winning filmmaker), selected the winners of the 2024 Big Syn International Film Festival from over 500 films and over 300 charity films received from over 120 countries.
The organiser of the festival, Big Syn Institute, is a part of the Centre for Big Synergy, a CSO of the United Nations Department of the Social and Economic Affairs (UN DESA), tasked to create a thriving, capable and responsible future for us and generations to come.
