Hunan Hyder
2022 · 19m · United Kingdom
Directed by Casi Wyn, Carys Huws
Genres: biography, documentary, LGBTQ+
Tones: contemplative, melancholic, tender
Shot during Self Esteem's tour of Britain and America, a visual portrait of singer and artist Marged, who processes trauma through performing on stage.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
A concert doc that could've been the usual tour footage wallpaper instead becomes a portrait of dysphoria and resilience—the subversive move here isn't the subject, it's the refusal to make the performance itself the climax.
Wyn and Huws situate themselves in the vérité-meets-portraiture lineage with formal precision, using the stage as both frame and mirror for internal processing; the editing rhythm between intimate and public space shows real consideration for how we witness vulnerability.
The filmmakers' decision to shoot *around* the performance rather than into it—favoring Marged's face in transit, in silence, in the margins—transforms a music doc into something about the cost of visibility, and it's that spatial choice that makes the whole thing breathe.