NEW GENERATION
The Film
Featuring Kojey Radical, AJ Tracey,Jevon, Dotty and Hacko
“These towers block vision, but the ends still feel like home tome” NEW GEN ‘Fuck Your Feelings-Kojey Radical’
NEW GENERATION is a15-minute short film inspired by lyrics from the NEW GEN album, released on XLRecordings back in 2017. The film’s concept, conceived by film making duo The Rest, was to highlight the issues faced by London’s inner-city youths ;issues that are accelerating at a rapid rate with every budget cut and implemented austerity measure.“We didn’t want to make a film directly about the music from the NEW GEN album, we wanted to try and paint a picture of the world that breeds it,”explains Lewis Levi, one half of the directing duo. “In the shadows of the steel and shiny city centre of London, inner city life can be grim in comparison, but that’s where the magic grows.”
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Lewis and his directing partner Alex Motlhabane were introduced to the NEW GEN project by their friend Kojey Radical. Partially shot the film around Grenfell Tower before the tragic fire that took the lives of 71 people, the film also features scenes that depict police violence as well as knife crime, problems that most people involved in the film have encountered. Levi explains: “When we first came up with the concept of the film, we just wanted to put a spotlight on these issues, which are ingrained in the black experience of living in the UK’s inner cities. But i t was shocking to us to find out in pre-production that almost every person we spoke to about the film had had someone close to them either get hurt or die because of crime within the city -mostly knife or gang related.These are issues that happens so regularly you read about them and then just move on, it’s normal.”
The film’s poignant and affecting visual cues are backed up by freestyle performances from Kojey Radical, Dotty and AJ Tracey, each one describing in painstaking detail situations that most of their peers can relate to with ease.
Since filming, knife crime in London has only increased and despite this rise, no government measures have been taken to tackle the issue. “Every now and then a story comes out and social media is outraged for a few days. That’s it,”says Levi, who’shopes are that the NEW GENERATION film goes further towards highlighting these pressing issues to helpimplement some sort of change.
About The Rest
THE REST are a filmmaking duo comprised of Alex Motlhabane and Lewis Levi. After collaborating on university projects, they decided to work under one name and focus on creating films with an unfiltered view of the world (often touching on social issues) and/or films that impact either with the story, shooting style or simply the colour.Since leaving university they’ve worked closely with Kojey Radical and produced genre defining work, from Bambuto Open Hand which premiered at the Tate Britain, this was followed by a MOBO nomination for Footsteps. They’ve also worked with slowthai in creating a visual style that is unique to him, changing the way people view and create lo-fi music videos.
