A film made by a female Charedi director who insisted it be shown only to women will be seen in London after two planned screenings were scrapped over legal concerns.

The Gift of Fire was due to be shown as part of the Israeli Film and Televsion Festival, Seret 2015 this week.

Director Rechy Elias demanded that, for religious reasons, men should be barred from seeing it.

Festival organisers cancelled a screening at the Odeon Swiss Cottage after the cinema group refused to agree to the restriction.

The Jewish community centre, JW3, then dropped its own screening on legal advice that a women-only audience may breach equality laws.

However, according to Seret organisers, a private, invitation-only screening will now take place at JW3 on Friday afternoon.

They said: “We will be screening this unique film as a Seret private, invite-only screening, not a public event, so that we can maintain the director’s wish that this is a film that can only be seen by women. It is a film that has been seen in Israel by female-only audiences, without any problems. It would be a huge shame if we could not show it to a UK audience.”