January 12 PRIDE
Director: Matthew Warchus
Cast:: Bill Nighy, Andrew Scott, Dominic West
Year: 2014
Runtime: 120 min
Country: United Kingdom
Language: English
Pride is inspired by an extraordinary true story. It's the summer of 1984, Margaret Thatcher is in power and the National Union of Mineworkers is on strike, prompting a London-based group of gay and lesbian activists to raise money to support the strikers' families. Initially rebuffed by the Union, the group identifies a tiny mining village in Wales and sets off to make their donation in person. As the strike drags on, the two groups discover that standing together makes for the strongest union of all.
Trailer
January 26
Due to an administrative error, this date was not included on the list sent to the Winston Churchill Cineplex, so there was no theatre available for us unfortunately. The film has been rescheduled for April (see below).
Trailer
January 26
Due to an administrative error, this date was not included on the list sent to the Winston Churchill Cineplex, so there was no theatre available for us unfortunately. The film has been rescheduled for April (see below).
February 9 Gemma Bovery
Director: Anne Fontaine
Cast:: Fabrice Luchini, Gemma Arterton, Jason Flemyng
Year: 2014
Runtime: 99 minutes
Country: France
Language: French | English
Martin, an ex-Parisian well-heeled hipster passionate about Gustave Flaubert who settled into a Norman village as a baker, sees an English couple moving into a small farm nearby. Not only are the names of the new arrivals Gemma and Charles Bovery, but their behavior also seems to be inspired by Flaubert's heroes.
Trailer
Trailer
February 23 Wet Bum
Director: Lindsay Mackay
Cast:: Julia Sarah Stone, Kenneth Welsh, Craig Arnold
Year: 2014
Runtime: 95 minutes
Country: Canada
Language: English
It's the start of the spring term in a small northern town, heralding swimming lessons, hanging out with best friends, new classes and new possibilities. But this year, things are different for 14-year-old Sam. While her friends are moving on, focusing on boys, experimenting with drugs, Sam is too uncomfortable to even take off her bathing suit in front of the other girls. After landing herself into trouble, she is forced to work as a cleaner at the retirement home run by her mother. Sam finds unexpected and unlikely friendships with two of the retirement home's residents who end up teaching Sam a few things about growing up and growing old.
Trailer
March 9 Elsa and Fred
Director: Michael Radford
Cast:: Christopher Plummer, Marcia Gay Harden, Shirley MacLaine
Year: 2014
Runtime: 104 minute
Country: USA
Language: English
This charming romantic comedy finds Elsa, a gregarious retiree who’s as lively as the New Orleans streets outside her apartment. When straight-laced widower Fred (Plummer) moves into her apartment building, the two fight and flirt like old lovers. Fred just wants to be left alone, but she won’t hear of it! This spirited script was adapted from an original film that played in theaters in Latin America for a year and spawned a successful stage play.
Trailer
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March 23 Mr. Turner
Director: Mike Leigh
Cast:: Timothy Spall, Paul Jesson, Dorothy Atkinson
Year: 2014
Runtime: 150 minute
Country: UK
Language: English
Trailer
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March 23 Mr. Turner
Director: Mike Leigh
Cast:: Timothy Spall, Paul Jesson, Dorothy Atkinson
Year: 2014
Runtime: 150 minute
Country: UK
Language: English
Mr. Turner explores the last quarter century of the great if eccentric British painter J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851). Profoundly affected by the death of his father, loved by a housekeeper he takes for granted and occasionally exploits sexually, he forms a close relationship with a seaside landlady with whom he eventually lives incognito in Chelsea, where he dies. Throughout this, he travels, paints, stays with the country aristocracy, visits brothels, is a popular if anarchic member of the Royal Academy of Arts, has himself strapped to the mast of a ship so that he can paint a snowstorm, and is both celebrated and reviled by the public and by royalty.
Interview with Timothy Spall
(April 6 is Easter Monday = no film)
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April 13 '71 2014 UK English
Director: Yann Demange
Cast:: Jack O'Connell, Sean Harris, Richard Dormer, Paul Anderson
Year: 2014
Runtime: 100 mins.
Country: United Kingdom
Language: English
A gripping and intense thriller set on the mean streets of Belfast in the early years of the Troubles, ’71 is a remarkably assured feature debut for director Yann Demange. Written by Scottish playwright Gregory Burke (who effectively explored soldier psychology in his award-winning stage play Black Watch), and an official selection of the 2014 Berlinale, ’71skillfully navigates the bloody politics of the era to focus on the horrors suffered by ordinary soldiers and civilians at the heart of this brutal conflict.
Rising star Jack O’Connell (Starred Up and the upcoming Unbroken) gives a galvanizing performance as Gary Hook, a fresh British recruit whose unit is dispatched to help with peacekeeping in the Northern Irish capital during the fatefully violent year of 1971. After a routine house raid in the Catholic part of town goes awry, Gary finds himself separated from his unit and pursued by an armed gang of Provisional IRA militia. With night closing in and no idea how to get back to his barracks, he must throw himself on the mercy of loyalist allies, whose nominal sympathies by no means translate into guarantees of sanctuary.
Visceral and palpably tense, ’71 offers a grunt’s-eye-view of a brutal and complex conflict, with O’Connell undeniably impressive and wholly convincing in his naïve and disbelieving reactions to the horrors around him. Beautifully shot, sporting an atmospheric production design that fully immerses you in the fraught and claustrophobic setting, and directed with a great sense of pace and excitement, ’71 is a haunting story of survival that elevates a specific situation to universal relevance.
(April 6 is Easter Monday = no film)
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April 13 '71 2014 UK English
Director: Yann Demange
Cast:: Jack O'Connell, Sean Harris, Richard Dormer, Paul Anderson
Year: 2014
Runtime: 100 mins.
Country: United Kingdom
Language: English
A gripping and intense thriller set on the mean streets of Belfast in the early years of the Troubles, ’71 is a remarkably assured feature debut for director Yann Demange. Written by Scottish playwright Gregory Burke (who effectively explored soldier psychology in his award-winning stage play Black Watch), and an official selection of the 2014 Berlinale, ’71skillfully navigates the bloody politics of the era to focus on the horrors suffered by ordinary soldiers and civilians at the heart of this brutal conflict.
Rising star Jack O’Connell (Starred Up and the upcoming Unbroken) gives a galvanizing performance as Gary Hook, a fresh British recruit whose unit is dispatched to help with peacekeeping in the Northern Irish capital during the fatefully violent year of 1971. After a routine house raid in the Catholic part of town goes awry, Gary finds himself separated from his unit and pursued by an armed gang of Provisional IRA militia. With night closing in and no idea how to get back to his barracks, he must throw himself on the mercy of loyalist allies, whose nominal sympathies by no means translate into guarantees of sanctuary.
Visceral and palpably tense, ’71 offers a grunt’s-eye-view of a brutal and complex conflict, with O’Connell undeniably impressive and wholly convincing in his naïve and disbelieving reactions to the horrors around him. Beautifully shot, sporting an atmospheric production design that fully immerses you in the fraught and claustrophobic setting, and directed with a great sense of pace and excitement, ’71 is a haunting story of survival that elevates a specific situation to universal relevance.
Trailer
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April 20 FORCE MAJEURE
Last Film of the season
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April 20 FORCE MAJEURE
Last Film of the season
Director: Ruben Ostlund
Cast:: Johannes Bah Kuhnke, Lisa Loven Kongsli, Clara Wettergren, Vincent Wettergren, Kristofer Hivju, Fanni Metelius
Year: 2014
Runtime: 118 mins.
Country: Sweden/Norway/Denmark/France
Language: Swedish/English/French (English Subtitles)
A Swedish family travels to the French Alps to enjoy a few days of skiing and spend some precious time with each other. The sun is shining and the slopes are spectacular but, during a lunch at a mountainside restaurant, an avalanche turns everything upside down.
Cast:: Johannes Bah Kuhnke, Lisa Loven Kongsli, Clara Wettergren, Vincent Wettergren, Kristofer Hivju, Fanni Metelius
Year: 2014
Runtime: 118 mins.
Country: Sweden/Norway/Denmark/France
Language: Swedish/English/French (English Subtitles)
A Swedish family travels to the French Alps to enjoy a few days of skiing and spend some precious time with each other. The sun is shining and the slopes are spectacular but, during a lunch at a mountainside restaurant, an avalanche turns everything upside down.
With diners fleeing in all directions, mother Ebba calls for her husband Tomas as she tries to protect their children. Tomas, meanwhile, is running for his life... Reality returns to embarrassed laughter, the anticipated disaster having failed to occur, and yet the family’s world has been shaken to its core.
Tomas’ unexpected action leads them to evaluate their roles and assumptions, a question mark hanging over their father in particular. With the end of the holiday approaching, Tomas and Ebba’s marriage hangs in the balance as Tomas struggles desperately to reclaim his role as family patriarch.
FORCE MAJEURE is an observational comedy about the role of the male in modern family life.
