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Cannes Film Festival

WOMAN AT WAR [KONA FER Í STRÍÐ – ICELAND], THU 26 SEPTEMBER, 8PM

By archive, Season 21 films

A music teacher leads a double life as an environmental warrior/industrial saboteur in this jet-black comedy.  An intelligent, feel-good film that manages to tackle urgent global issues with humour.

Meet Halla, a music teacher in her forties. She is a happy, upbeat woman who leads a quiet and routine life. But unbeknown to most she is also ‘The Mountain Woman’: a lone wolf environmental activist who disrupts the operations of an aluminium plant in the Icelandic highlands, by cutting power supply and damaging pylons in acts of industrial sabatogue.

As the authorities intensify their campaign to catch her, she receives an update on a long forgotten adoption application and learns she has been matched with a four-year-old girl in the Ukraine. Can she reconcile this with her crusade to protect her homeland from big industry or will her efforts destroy her chances of finally becoming a mother?

A funny, moving and utterly unique film.

A huge showcase for Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir, who brings grit, determination, and quiet charisma to every scene. An engaging curiosity and an absolute joy. – The Irish Times

Amid the jet-black comedy of Woman at War, which takes as its catastrophic subject matter the despoliation of planet Earth, there is a warmth, wit and wisdom that transcend national and cultural boundaries, making this a truly universal treat. – The Guardian ★★★★

97% rating and ★★★★★ from Rotten Tomatoes.

Winner – Best Screenplay, Critics’ Week, Cannes Film Festival 2018

Winner – LUX Film Prize 2018

Iceland, 2018 | Language: Icelandic | 101 minutes | Cert: 12A

Director: Benedikt Erlingsson

Cast: Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir, Jóhann Sigurðarson, Roman Estrada, Jörundur Ragnarsson

EVERYBODY KNOWS [TODOS LO SABEN – SPAIN], THU 24 OCTOBER, 8PM

By archive, Season 21 films

Oscar-winning filmmaker Asghar Farhadi’s (A Separation) intimately painful and powerfully acted drama centres on a shocking crime that interrupts a family wedding.  Starring Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem.

Laura (Cruz) returns to Spain with her children for her sister’s wedding. There she is reunited with her former lover Paco (Bardem) now happily married and running a successful vineyard on land once owned by Laura’s family. Whilst Laura’s husband, Alejandro (Ricardo Darín) stayed behind in Argentina, an old rumour of her jilting Paco reignites. Moreover, within Laura’s family, resentment simmers over the manner in which Paco acquired the vineyard.

A seething mystery unfurls as secrets, lies and unhealed wounds spanning generations are brought to light. Everybody Knows is an unforgettable portrait of love, loss, and betrayal.

This is Iranian auteur Asghar Farhadi’s eighth feature and his first in Spanish.

Explores the unhealed wound at the heart of a Spanish family with pitiless efficiency and sheer muscular flair…the performances are so intelligent, mature and yet uninhibited…Farhadi’s storytelling has overpowering force.The Guardian  ★★★★

The characters, observations and performances make this film shine.The Independent ★★★★★

Spain, 2018 | Language: Spanish | 133 minutes | Cert: 15A

Director: Asghar Farhadi

Cast: Penélope Cruz, Javier Bardem, Ricardo Darín

JUST TO BE SURE [OTEZ-MOI D’UN DOUTE – FRANCE], THU 31 JANUARY 8PM

By archive, Season 20 Films

The breakout French hit of the 2017 Cannes International Film Festival, where it premiered to multiple, raucous standing ovations, writer/director Carine Tardieu’s charming romantic comedy is a winning tale of parenthood, love and family, both lost and found.

When lonely 45-year-old widower Erwan discovers by accident that that man who raised him isn’t his real father, he begins a search for his biological one. Thanks to a local private detective he soon locates the mischievous, 70-something Joseph, whom it seems his mother may have known briefly. Erwan soon falls not only for his charm, but that of the impetuous Anna, who has ties to them both. But the conflicting loyalties become compounded by the pregnancy of his own daughter who defiantly refuses to name the father.  Soon Erwan’s families begin to collide, to unexpected, hilarious and moving effect.

Offering a terrific showcase for her brilliant cast, director Carine Tardieu skillfully weaves a wholly-entertaining exploration of love, coincidence and human connection. Few films manage to pluck both the heartstrings and the funny bone.  It’s a delight.

Light-hearted, sharp and funny, the kind of French comedy that doesn’t come around so often nowadays. – The Hollywood Reporter

The comedy favourite of Cannes. Invigorating and intelligent. -Le Parisien  ★★★★★

Beautiful, touching and hilarious. This film will move you. – Elle Magazine ★★★★

France, 2017 | Language: France | 100 minutes | Cert: CLUB

Director:  Carine Tardieu

Cast:  Francois Damiens, Cecile De France, Guy Marchand, Andre Wilms, Alice de Lencquesaing

Presented with the support of the French Embassy and the Institut Français.

C’EST LA VIE! [FRANCE], THU 14 FEBRUARY, 8PM

By archive, Season 20 Films

A relentlessly hilarious comedy about a wedding planner, it hits the ground running and barely takes a breath as wedding disaster after disaster unfold. Larger-than-life characters and laugh-out-loud set pieces make it a delight.

Max is a veteran wedding planner who is thinking about selling on his business. For now, however, there’s something more pressing to worry about: organising a lavish wedding in a 17th century chateau. It’s no small task, with dozens of people to manage, unreliable electricity, a last-minute musician change, and an increasingly demanding groom. Soon, things start going very wrong indeed. Can Max and his team sort everything out without the guests noticing?

Few films this year will provide as much sheer joy as this bubbly, charming and relentlessly hilarious jog around an arena we’re all familiar with. The ensemble cast has great fun with a dotty assortment of characters, every one of which is put to delightful use.Irish Independent ★★★★

A cluttered comedy that works like a charm.The Irish Times★★★

France, 2017 |Language: French | 117 minutes | Cert: CLUB

Directors:  Olivier Nakache, Éric Toledano  

Cast: Jean-Pierre Bacri, Gilles Lellouche, Jean-Paul Rouve, Eye Haidara

 

COLD WAR [ZIMNA WOJNA – POLAND] – THU 28 FEBRUARY, 8PM

By archive, Season 20 Films

We’ve had massive audiences this season and have had to turn people away.

Anticipating huge interest in the two upcoming films that have been nominated for

the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film [among other awards]

and to avoid further disappointment, we have added screenings for these films:

Cold War [Zimna Wojna – Poland], Thursday 28 February at 6pm and 8pm.

Box office opens for first screening at 5:30pm.

A chilling Soviet-era drama of wounded love and state sponsored fear in 1950s Poland from the director of Ida, which won the 2015 Academy Award Winner for Best Foreign Language Film. Best Director prize winner at Cannes.

Without any hyperbole, it is one of the films of the year, and possibly of the last decade.Irish Independent   ★★★★

Paweł Pawlikowski follows his Oscar-winning Ida with the stunning Cold War, an epic romance set against the backdrop of Europe after World War II. Sumptuously shot in luminous black and white, it spans decades and nations to tell a love story that is as tragic as it is moving, and as transportive as it is honest.

In the ruins of post-war Poland, Wiktor and Zula fall deeply, obsessively and destructively in love. As performing musicians forced to play into the Soviet propaganda machine, they dream of escaping to the creative freedom of the West. But one day, as they spot their chance to make a break for Paris, both make a split decision that will mark their lives forever. As the years march on in the wake of that moment, Wiktor and Zula watch the world changing around them, always struggling to find their moment in time.

Pawlikowski melds the personal with the political to exquisite effect. Set to a soundtrack that takes you from the rustic folk songs of rural Poland to the sultry jazz of a Paris basement bar, it’s a wistful and dreamlike journey through a divided continent – and a heartbreaking portrait of ill-fated love.

Irish Times – One of the Best Films of 2018. ★★★★

Ida director Pawel Pawlikowski’s exquisitely chilling Soviet-era drama maps the dark heart of Poland itself.The Guardian ★★★★

Poland, 2018 |Language: Polish | 88 minutes | Cert: CLUB

Director: Pawel Pawlikowski

Cast:  Joanna Kulig, Tomasz Kot, Borys Szyc, Cedric Kahn

 

SHOPLIFTERS [JAPAN], THU 7 MARCH, 8PM

By archive, Season 20 Films

We’ve had massive audiences this season and have had to turn people away.

Anticipating huge interest in the two upcoming films that have been nominated for

the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film [among other awards]

and to avoid further disappointment, we have added screenings for these films:

Shoplifters [Japan], Thursday 7 March at 5:45pm and 8pm.

Box office for first screening opens at 5:15pm.

Winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes 2018.  A drama of rare complexity and quality about the forces holding a struggling family together, it reveals a Japan rarely seen. 

A masterpieceThe Irish Times ★★★★★

On the margins of Tokyo, a dysfunctional band of outsiders are united by fierce loyalty, a penchant for petty theft and playful grifting. When the young son is arrested, secrets are exposed that upend their tenuous, below-the-radar existence and test their quietly radical belief that it is love—not blood—that defines a family.

A film by Kore-Eda Hirokazu, the director of Still Walking, Like Father, Like Son and Nobody Knows.

A film of rare depth and quality that explores the meaning of family, and suggests that real parenthood is not given, but earned.The Guardian ★★★★

Kore-eda’s great subject is the contemporary family, a topic that gives him an immensity of themes, including loss, love, class, alienation in the modern world…a perfect story about being human.The New York Times

Japan, 2017 | Language:  Japanese | 121 minutes | Cert: 15A

Director:  Hirokazu Koreeda

Cast:  Kirin Kiki, Lily Franky, Moemi Katayama

 

JEUNE FEMME [FRANCE], THU 27 SEPTEMBER, 8PM

By archive

A superbly sympathetic and spikily comedic portrait of a rudderless young woman in search of an identity.  She’s determined to make a new start with style. 

Winner, Camera d’Or for best first feature film, Cannes Film Festival 2017.

Broke, with nothing but her cat to her name and doors closing in her face, Paula is back in Paris after a long absence. As she meets different people along the way, there is one thing she knows for sure: she’s determined to make a new start – and she’ll do it with style and panache.

Director Léonor Serraille deservedly scooped the Camera d’Or prize at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival for this debut feature. Jeune Femme impresses with it sheer vivacity and the powerhouse central performance of actress Laetitia Dosch as Paula provides the wild heart of the film. This is cinema that is funny, moving and hugely invigorating.

Comedy with a soaring, free-spirited lead…A white-knuckle sense of emotional freefall powers every fraught scene.The Irish Times ★★★★

Laetitia Dosch dazzles in Léonor Serraille’s debut feature as a young Parisian woman struggling to work out who she is.The Guardian ★★★★

The film plays like an assured American comedy with its quick-fire pacing and conventional, redemptive arc. But the film is pure French in its tone and atmosphere. – Little White Lies, Cannes Film Festival 2017

France, 2017 |Language: France | 98 minutes | Cert: 15

Director:   Léonor Serraille

Cast:  Laetitia Dosch, Souleymane Seye Ndiaye, Grégoire Monsaingeon

THE RIDER [USA], THU 25 OCTOBER, 8PM

By archive

Brady, a South Dakota rodeo cowboy, suffers a near-fatal accident that halts his career and forces him to re-evaluate his future.  A beautifully crafted and absorbing glimpse of ‘real-life’ America.

Winner Art Cinema Award at Cannes 2017.

Brady is a talented South Dakota bronco rider and horse trainer – cowboys and rodeos are the centre of his world. So when he suffers a near-fatal accident that halts his career, Brady struggles to recover from a serious head-injury that forces him to reevaluate his future.

Chinese-born director Chloé Zhao proves that her acclaimed debut feature Songs My Brothers Taught Me was no flash-in-the-pan, as she returns with another beautifully crafted and absorbing glimpse of ‘real-life’ America in this second feature. Casting non-professional actors as versions of themselves allows her to bring a unique authenticity and intimacy to the story – the result is a powerfully emotional and touching exploration of humanity.

The best American movie this critic has seen in the past year…The commanding abilities Chloé Zhao shows in “The Rider” easily mark her as one of the world’s most important young directors. – rogerebert.com ★★★

Study of a damaged rodeo rider is a hugely impressive slice of prairie naturalism.The Irish Times  ★★★★★

Impressive, stylish bronco rider drama bucks the trend.  Chloé Zhao’s distinctive new feature shows life among South Dakota’s star bronco riders, who play themselves in a kind of heightened documentary. – The Guardian ★★★

Click here to watch an interview with the director and Brady.

Click here for official website.

USA, 2017 | Language:  English | 104 minutes | Cert: CLUB TBC

Director:  Chloé Zhao

Cast:  Brady Jandreau, Tim Jandreau, Lilly Jandreau