Club Scannáin - Film Clubs

Ballina Arts Centre

Ballina Civic Offices, Arran Place, Ballina, Co. Mayo.

T: 096 73593

E: ballinaartscentre@gmail.net

W: www.ballinaartscentre.com

Adoration (Dir: Atom Egoyan, Canada, 2008)

Tuesday 5th October, 8pm

An ancient news story takes on new viral life after a teenager transforms a simple translation exercise into a riveting narrative about his own dead parents, imagining his father as a terrorist who places a bomb in his pregnant girlfriend’s handbag. When their teacher, Sabine (Arsinée Khanjian), has Simon (Devon Bostick) read the story in class, his classmates receive it as truth and turn it into an Internet sensation, the tale growing ever larger over a series of chats, eventually pulling in participants of the actual incident. But Sabine is not through, further roiling the waters by provocatively confronting Tom (Scott Speedman), Simon’s unhappy uncle.

For his twelfth feature, Atom Egoyan once more explores the way the past impacts the present and how grief manifests and sometimes curdles over the years. The drama marks a return to the elliptical style he pioneered with such films as Speaking Parts (1989) and The Adjuster (1991). Adm: €7 (seasonal membership rates available).

His & Hers (Dir: Ken Wardrop, Ireland, 2009)

Tuesday 19th October, 8pm

Rarely have the odd and the ordinary combined to such beguiling effect. Winner of a host of prizes, Ken Wardrop’s debut feature comprises a large number of conversations with ordinary (but remarkable) Irish women. About 70 women, all from the Irish midlands, arranged in ascending order of age, tell stories about the men in their lives.

Shot in slightly grainy, attractively washed-out colours, the participants begin by discussing dads, go on to ponder boyfriends, and then move on to sons and husbands. We begin with a baby; we end with an elderly lady philosophically contemplating decline.

As the film progresses, the various unseen men appear to coalesce into a portrait of one decent, slightly useless but hopelessly lovable individual. He makes a nice curry, but he doesn’t do such a good job with the washing-up.

Among the most moving of many touching moments comes when a young contributor discusses her boyfriend (and all boyfriends). “It’s like they have your heart in their hands and they can do what they like with it,” she says. The result is a near-perfect act of cinematic sleight of hand: a beautiful tale told apparently by accident. No wonder His & Hers is the most lauded Irish film since Hunger. Adm: €7 (seasonal membership rates available).

WESTPORT FILM CLUB

Westport Cineplex

March 3rd 2010 at 8.45 pm

NO ONE KNOWS ABOUT PERSIAN CATS

Director : Bahman Ghobadi Iran l 2009 l Persian | 106 minutes l colour

The Iranian-Kurdish director Bahman Ghobadi takes an interest in the hectic subculture of rock and heavy metal in Teheran. In a mixture of documentary comedy, drama and thriller, Ghobadi composes both a serenade to and an indictment of his beloved Teheran, shackled as it is by religious fanatics, with Nobody Knows About Persian Cats. The title refers to an Iranian law that bans dogs and cats from going outside. The film tells the story of two young musicians, Negar and Ashkan, who have just been freed from jail where they had been imprisoned for playing rock music. They go looking for other musicians to play a gig. When they later want passports to flee to a country with more freedom, they end up in a hair-raising adventure.

LINENHALL ARTS CENTRE

Linenhall St, Castlebar, Mayo.

T: 094 9023733

E: linenhall@anu.ie

W: www.thelinenhall.com

Tuesday 12th October @ 8.00pm

The Happiest Girl in The World (Cea mai fericita fata din lume)

Romania  2009  100mins  Language: Romanian with English subtitles

The happiest girl referred to in the title of director Radu Jude’s wry comedy drama is Delia, a provincial high-school student who wins a new car in a soft drink competition and travels to Bucharest with her parents to feature in the product’s latest TV advertisement. Over an increasingly fractious day attempting to film a 35 second commercial, replete with nitpicking sponsors and technical difficulties, the relationship between sulky daughter and cajoling parents unfolds. Delia wants to keep the car to impress her friends, the parents want her to sign it over so they can sell it to finance a B&B back in the country. Shedding an ironic light on post-communist Romania, the film explores both social and generational strands with typically deadpan Romanian humour.

Adm.: €5