Penwith Film Society Autumn/Winter 2008 season
Please note that the films are scheduled the week before, so forexact timings please look at the Merlin Cinemas site. Or you can phone the Savoy, Penzance: 01736 363330 or the Royal, St Ives: 01736 796843. As our seasons are proving so popular, to avoid bitter disappointment you can buy tickets from the Savoy from the Wednesday before the film. There is no telephone booking as yet. Write-ups: by Steve Payne (society chair), photos © their respective owners. |
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| SEPTEMBER 7 / 8 and 9 / 10 |
EDGE OF HEAVEN | |
Fatih Akin |
 Akin again (remember Against The Wall?) tackles the enduring issues of German/Turkish identity, nationality, love and loyalty in a compelling drama that, while reliant on circumstance and coincidence, nonetheless nails its component parts together with a rarely seen assurance and aplomb. Throw in five fantastic lead performances and you have contemporary European cinema of the very highest order. Strongly recommended. |
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| SEPTEMBER 14/15 and 16/17 | THE LAST MISTRESS | |
Catherine Breillat |
 There’s more than a touch of Liaisons Dangereuses in this steamy adaptation of Jules Barbey d’Aurevilly’s scandalous 1851 novel which questions whether impoverished aristocrat Ryno de Marigny will be able to give up his beloved mistress la Vellini (Argento in seductive form) on the occasion of his forthcoming marriage; their dalliance has, after all, lasted ten years. Breillat puts it all together with a stunning design palette, ravishing camerawork, an eloquent script, and brilliantly elicited performances. Seriously sensual et très magnifique! |
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| SEPTEMBER 21/22 and 23/24 | MONGOL | |
| Sergei Bodrov Russia 2007 | 15 | 125m | subtitles Aliya | Tadanobu Asano | Sun Honglei | Khulan Chuluun |
 Who says they don’t make ‘em like this any more? Epic in scope and execution, this charts the life of the young Genghis Khan, the first film in a projected trilogy about the Emperor of the Mongols. Asano more than carries the central role while the cinematography exploits the widescreen locations to the hilt, complete with huge set-piece battles involving a cast of thousands. Majestic and overwhelming with a historically detailed sense of spectacle, this is the one film you cannot afford to miss this season. Early booking advisable. |
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| SEPTEMBER 28/29 and 30/ OCTOBER 1 | MEMORIES OF UNDERDEVELOPMENT | |
Tomás Gutiérrez Alea |
 Almost a companion piece to I Am Cuba, this film details the hiatus in Havana after the fall of the Batista regime, as wealthy dilettante writer Sergio, abandoned by his wife, family and friends (all of whom have fled to Miami), mooches the Malecon in melancholy mode, a moving metaphor for the inertia of Cuba’s ambitions. This newly furbished B&W print renders the ennui in exquisite detail, while pungent punctuations of Godardian polemic prevent it from descending into bathos. A unique, visionary production, shot through with its own cinematic poetry. |
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| OCTOBER 5/6 and 7/8 |
SOMERS TOWN | |
Shane Meadows |
 PFS always flies the flag for British talent, and this, the follow-up to the enormously popular This Is England, warrants automatic inclusion. The adolescent protagonist of the former flick shines again in a heart-warming B&W North London tale of an unlikely friendship forged with the photographer son of a Polish immigrant labourer working at King’s Cross station. Meadows is on top form here, revitalising the 60’s British Kitchen Sink drama aesthetic and investing it with his trademark parochial sensibility. Essential viewing. |
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| OCTOBER 12/13 and 14/15 | MY WINNINPEG | |
Guy Maddin |
 Movie maverick Maddin serves up a bracing and idiosyncratic meditation on his perma-frozen home town (through the amanuensis of a somnolent train-traveller) in this ‘docu-fasia’ made up of archive material, animations, TV-soap-style deconstructions, reveries, dreams and delirious dramatisations, including one featuring Ann Savage (the femme fatale from Edward G Ulmer’s noir classic Detour) as his mother. All human life is there somewhere, compelling in its Canadian eccentricity. |
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| OCTOBER 19/20 and 21/22 | THE POPE’S TOILET | |
Enrique Fernández / César Charlone |
 As the impoverished inhabitants of the Uruguayan village of Melo prepare to welcome the Pope, one man, patriarch Beto, listens to his inner entrepreneur and resolves to build a luxury loo for the relief of the expected 50,000 pilgrims and for the benefit of his pocket and family. Wrapped up in this delightfully madcap comedy are some keenly pointed observations about the Church and the causes of poverty. Don’t miss this one, an utter delight from start to finish. |
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| 23 OCTOBER SAVOY ONE DAY SPECIAL + AGM 7.00 |
JULES ET JIM | |
Francois Truffaut |
 Truffaut’s third feature, and one of the defining moments of the French nouvelle vague, is ostensibly a love-triangle; the two eponymous young men, one French, the other German (survivors of WW1 who fought, ever fearful they might kill one other), are united in their adoration for the mercurial, unobtainable Catherine (Moreau at her most transcendent). This nimble-footed narrative, hopelessly romantic yet suffused with melancholy, neatly nails the moment when the yearning of youth is replaced by the circumspection of nostalgia. |
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| NOVEMBER 9/10 and 11/12 | COUSCOUS | |
Abdel Kechiche |
 This delightful domestic drama, set in the Mediterranean port of Sete, is built around separated, 60-year-old immigrant ship-worker Slimane, who dreams of opening a restaurant when he becomes unemployed. But his plans are very much at the mercy of the women in his life – his ex-wife Souad (whom he expects to provide the eponymous signature meal), his mistress Latifa and his feisty daughter Rym. Exceptionally sensitive ensemble playing and intimate photography give this chamber piece a detailed richness seldom seen on-screen. |
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| NOVEMBER 16/17 and 18/19 |
HONEYDRIPPER | |
| John Sayles USA 2007 | PG | 123m Danny Glover | Gary Clark Jr | Stacy Keach | Keb’ Mo | Mabel John |
 This is a total blast! The blues had a baby and they called it Rock & Roll – the midwife, in this case, is one Tyrone ‘Pine-Top’ Purvis (Glover in brilliant form), a soon-to-be foreclosed club owner (The Honeydripper Lounge) who stakes everything on itinerant guitarist Sonny to lure in the crowds. The period details are spot-on, but this is no mere exercise in nostalgia; there’s a sense of history being made and one man defining his own destiny. The soundtrack, it goes without saying, is sensational. Don’t miss it! |
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| NOVEMBER 23/24 and 25/26 |
FLIGHT OF THE RED BALLOON | |
| Hou Hsiao-Hsien Taiwan 2007 | PG | 115m | subtitles Juliette Binoche | Song Fvang | Simon Iteanu | Hippolyte Girardot |
 La Binoche (in this homage to Albert Lamorisse’s 1959 The Red Balloon), a harassed single mum working for a Chinese puppet theatre company in Paris, takes on a Chinese film student, Song, as a nanny to her neglected son. The pair begin to unlock the secrets of the world around them (a Paris that never looked lovelier), a process of discovery rendered with Hou’s typically meandering takes and gently inquisitive camera work. Engaging, absorbing and refreshingly intimate. |
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| NOVERMBER 30 / DECEMBER 1 and 2/3 |
STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE | |
| Errol Morris USA 2008 | 15 | 116m with Lynndie England | Javal Davis | Janis Karpinski | et al |
 The shocking images of Iraqi prisoner abuse from Abu Ghraib prison resonated around the world, seriously damaging America’s moral justification for its ‘war on terror’. This coolly dispassionate documentary takes no sides; rather, it presents, via a series of talking heads, re-enactments and documentary material, a situation where a moral and legal vacuum was allowed to exist, condoned and nurtured by highly placed commanding officers. It’s dark, disturbing and unsettling viewing, and demands to be seen by anyone with a conscience. |
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| DECEMBER 7/8 and 9/10 |
IN SEARCH OF A MIDNIGHT KISS | |
| Alex Holdrige USA 2008 | 15 | 110m Scoot McNairy | Sara Simmonds | Brian Matthew McGuire |
 New Year’s Eve in unglamorous downtown LA finds unsuccessful screenwriter Wilson hooking up with sassy, bad-ass, tons-of-attitude blonde Vivian, a last-minute date sourced from craigslist.com, the downmarket version of eBay. Are they both too cynical for romance, or will love find its way? This low-key B&W debut features terrific characterisations, snappy dialogue and much salty humour, but the real star is the slumbering city itself, which contributes so much to the mood of languorous, unrequited romance. |
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| DECEMBER 14/15 and 16/17 |
IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE | |
| Frank Capra USA 1946 | PG | 129m James Stewart | Donna Reed | Lionel Barrymore | Henry Travers |
 Although only peripherally involved with the Yuletide season, this Jimmy Stewart career-defining classic nonetheless invokes the sentiments of modest charity and selfless small-town endeavour by which the majority measure and celebrate their lives, especially at Christmas. Genial, sweet and sentimental it may be, but there’s plenty enough vim and vinegar in this perennial favourite to register the righteousness of moral indignation, especially in one of the greatest fantasy sequences ever filmed. All this, lots of snow, a happy ending and an angel called Clarence. ”Merry Christmas, Bedford Falls!” Merry Christmas, Penzance! |
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