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Caramel - 4th December 2009 CARAMEL (LEBANON/FRANCE, 2007, 95 mins, sub-titled)
Director: Nadine Labaki
With Joanna Moukarzel, Nadine Labaki, Yasmine al Masri
Members’ choice – selected by Philippa Cripps
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A feisty and funny look at the search for happiness of friends who work in a Beirut beauty parlour. The title refers to a sticky leg wax used to remove unwanted feminine hair. The unmarried thirty-something proprietor (Labaki) from a Christian family, is having a secret affair with a married man, while her mostly Muslim colleagues have their own problems. One is a not so virginal bride-to-be, another is a lesbian who struggles for self-expression in Lebanese society. An assured debut by writer/director Labaki and a mainly non-professional cast, Caramel is warm-hearted, authentic, beautifully observed and uplifting. “Delightful” – Time Out
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Miracle on 34th Street - 18th December 2009 MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET (USA, 1947, 93 mins, black/white)
Director: George Seaton
With Maureen O’Hara, Natalie Wood, Edmund Glenn
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At last – a proper Christmas movie! Enjoy complimentary mince pies and mulled wine as you watch this magical, treble Oscar-winning film which glows with goodwill. In New York, Macy’s store executive Doris Walker (Maureen O’Hara) has raised her young daughter (Natalie Wood) not to believe in fairy tales. But faced with a last-minute panic in the Christmas grotto, she hires a Santa (Edmund Glenn) who not only claims to be the real Kris Kringle, but turns out to be a huge success as he advances the true spirit of Christmas amidst all the rampant commercialism around him. Cue a battle with the store’s psychologist who believes this Santa to be delusional. Original, utterly charming and a perennial holiday classic.
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Anything For Her - 8th January 2010 ANYTHING FOR HER (FRANCE, 2008 96mins sub-titled) Director: Fred Cavaye
With Diane Kruger, Vincent Lindon
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French schoolteacher Julien (Lindon) sees his life go from domestic bliss to disaster when his wife is imprisoned for murdering her boss, in this taut thriller from debut director Fred Cavaye. No-one believes her protestations of innocence and after an abortive attempt to get the case reopened, hubby is driven to desperate measures.
Revealing the truth about the murder early on, Cavaye gets us on side immediately. Reminiscent of Jean-Paul Belmondo, the hangdog Lindon is totally watchable as an increasingly desperate gun-toting vigilante in a state of mental chaos, while ex-model Kruger is convincing in her transformation from thrusting executive to fraying, suicidal, incarcerated wife.
Anything For Her is a gripping, bullet-ridden roller coaster ride. Stylish, cleverly-plotted and with some great twists, it delivers with a suitably edge-of-the-seat climax.
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Looking For Eric - 22nd January 2010 LOOKING FOR ERIC (UK, 2009 116mins) Director: Ken Loach
With Steve Evets, Eric Cantona
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Downtrodden Eric Bishop is a Manchester postman who has lost control of his life. He wants his ex-wife, Lily, back - even though she left him twenty years ago. In desperation, he addresses a poster of his footballing hero, Eric Cantona - and his idol comes to life. Cue an upbeat, touching fantasy/comedy set in the real world of Ken Loach. The philosophical Cantona becomes a therapist for his luckless namesake and in the brilliant cast Steve Evets, Loach has found a sometime stand-up and jobbing actor who seems to have real emotions and deeply engages with his permanently stunned expression. Cantona's charm and hint of self-mockery is a winning turn but the laughs are tinged with heartbreak as the film's chief concerns of unresolved grief and working-class solidarity are never far from the surface. Looking for Eric is accessible, uplifting and inspired - and it's fun!
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The Band's Visit - plus Winslow Concert Band - 5th February 2010 THE BAND'S VISIT (Israel, 2006 87mins sub-titled) Director: Eran Kolirin With Sasson Gabai, Ronit Elkabetz - with WINSLOW CONCERT BAND playing from 7pm and again during the interval ********************************************************************** This charming, witty and unpretentious little film tracks the progress of the Alexandria Police Marching Band, which travels from Egypt to Israel for a concert at an Arab Cultural Centre and manages to get lost after taking the wrong airport bus. Stranded overnight in a desolate settlement,they grudgingly accept hospitality from kindly bar owner Dina (Elkabetz) and a strange union develops between her and the band's rigid, uptight leader Tawfiq (Gabai). This seems to suggest that friendships are possible once initial culture clashes are overcome, although first-time director Kolirin wisely steers clear of local politics. There are laughs a-plenty too, especially in a memorable seduction scene at the town's roller disco. Subtle and understated,The Band's Visit is a low-budget whimsy which has deservedly won numerous audience awards and played to a rapturous reception at the Cannes Film festival. |
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Frozen River - 19th February 2010 FROZEN RIVER (USA, 2008 97mins) Director: Courtney Hunt With Melissa Leo, Misty Upham, Michael O'Keefe ********************************************************************* Winner of the Grand Jury prize at last year's Sundance Festival, Courtney Hunt's independent debut feature is set in upstate New York on the desolate US-Canadian border. Ray Eddy (Leo) is a decent mother working in a convenience store and coping with two sons in her rundown trailer park home. Her gambling husband has left, taking their savings with him. By chance, she meets belligerent Lila Littlewolf (Upham), a Mohawk Indian, who has also been deserted and can't hold down a job. At first mutually suspicious,they eventually find common ground and become people smugglers, driving illegal immigrants across the frozen St Lawrence river into America. Tense and unsentimental, Hunt's tough, blue-collar movie skilfully explores the lengths to which people under pressure will go to survive. It wowed the critics and Upham and Leo work together with great conviction. |
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Rififi - 5th March 2010 RIFIFI (FRANCE, 1955 118mins black/white sub-titled) Director: Jules Dassin
With Jean Servais
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Classic downbeat heist thriller, in which a group of thieves band together for a daring jewel robbery and fall out afterwards.
Ageing, embittered career criminal Tony Le Stephanois (Servais) has just been released from prison and reluctantly agrees to lead three other protagonists in an audacious raid on a heavily-alarmed Parisian store.
Deftly-handled with pace and simplicity, the movie adeptly conveys the harsh and brutal world of the 1950's French underworld, especially in a scene where Tony inflicts a punishment beating on his former girlfriend who has transferred her affections to a rival.
Rififi is one cinema's seminal robbery movies, with its suspenseful 30-minute set-piece with no dialogue or music. Francois Truffaut described it as "the best film-noir I've ever seen". |
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The Hurt Locker - 19th March 2010 THE HURT LOCKER (USA, 2008 131mins) Director: Kathryn Bigelow
With Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie, Brian Geraghty
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Widely acclaimed as the best film to date about the Iraq war, The Hurt Locker is based on journalist Mark Boal's experience, embedded with a US bomb disposal squad in Baghdad during 2004. The three-man team is lead by Staff Sergeant William James (Renner) who is prone to suicidal displays of bravado as the experts defuse a range of improvised explosive devices (IEDs.
Greatly helped the casting of unknowns, rather than Hollywood stars, the movie crackles with tension in every scene. A powerful action film in its own right, The Hurt Locker offers a different slant on Iraq, confronting the fact that soldiers often take great pleasure in war. While one character longs to be at home with his family, another is a mouthy maverick an all-American hero who cannot wait to take another tour of duty. Bigelow doesn't preach about why the conflict has arisen, but concentrates on how three soldiers deal with the everyday perils of keeping the peace in Baghdad. |
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Special Event - 9th April 2010 KEEP YOUR DIARY FREE AND WATCH THIS SPACE!!! |
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Annual Meeting - plus The Odd Couple - 16th April 2010 ANNUAL MEETING AT 7PM, FOLLOWED BY COMPLIMENTARY BUFFET AND WINE.....PLUS, AT 8.30PM, THE ODD COUPLE (USA, 1967, 105 mins) Director: Gene Saks With Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau ******************************************************* ************** "Everything you do irritates me. And when you're not here, everything I know you're going to do irritates me". A comedy classic to end the season! Fastidious Felix Ungar (Lemmon) has just split up with his wife. Depressed and suicidal, he moves in with his friend, a slob named Oscar (Matthau). Sports reporter Oscar is divorced and he tries to help hypochondriac Felix get back on his dating feet while they share their New York apartment. However, the two come to odds when neatness and slovenliness collide. Based on Neil Simon's successful stage play, this comical and poignant film has been consistently voted one of the funniest movies ever made - and the irresistable double act of Lemmon and Matthau has never been better. Enduring and endearing. ********************************************************************* COME ALONG TO THE AGM FIRST AND GIVE YOUR VIEWS ON THE FILM SOCIETY - LET US KNOW WHAT IMPROVEMENTS YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE! OR JUST COME AND SEE THE MOVIE - USUAL ADMISSION CHARGES APPLY. ********************************************************************* |