Hooky Movie Nights 2019-2020
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Embrace of the Serpent: January 4thSept 21st LOVING VINCENT
Dorita Kobeila. Hugh Welchman UK/Poland/USA 2017 12A
This is a cinema first: the film was shot with actors and then each of its 64,OOO frames was lovingly painted over by a team of 120 artists in stylistic homage to Van Gogh’s greatest works of art. One year after Vincent van Gogh’s presumed suicide, a postman’s son delivers the artist’s last letter to his brother. The contents of the letter cast doubt upon the true nature of Van Gogh’s demise. “One of the most beautiful films of 2017” – Empire magazine.
Oct 5th HAPPY AS LAZZARO
Alice Rohrwacher Italy 2018 128 mins PG13
Set in an isolated village in Italy, this is a time-twisting, magical realist tale of a family of share croppers who live under the tyrannical yoke of a corrupt tobacco magnate. One of the villagers is the innocent and saintly Lazarro who draws the attention of a young nobleman. “This supernatural folk tale of the birth of modern Italy is as sublime as it is beautiful” – Time Out
Oct 19th 3 FACES
Jafar Panahi. Iran, 2018. 15
This is the celebrated director’s fourth film since he received a 20 year ban on travel and film making from the Iranian government. A film director, played by Panahi himself, receives a phone video message from a young girl apparently about to hang herself because her parents are crushing her dreams of being an actress. The director drops his current project and, accompanied by his leading actress, travels to the girl’s village to investigate. “An immersive, intelligent road movie that becomes a political allegory” – New York Times
Nov 2nd SING STREET
John Carney. Ireland, 2016. 12A
A bitter-sweet but ultimately heart-warming tale of a teenager’s passion for both music and a mysterious girl. Set in 1980s recession-ridden Dublin, this semi-autobiographical film tells the story of fourteen year old Conor who forms a band with his school- friends to impress the mysterious girl and to forget about his parents’ crumbling marriage. Together, the boys make wacky videos and write songs inspired by the great bands of the time: The Cure, The Jam, Spandau Ballet and more. “Sing Street is the most romantic movie you’ll find anywhere these days, brimming over with music, fun and the thrill of first love” – Rolling Stone
Nov 23rd HUNT FOR THE WILDERPEOPLE
Taika Waititi. New Zealand, 2016. 12A
Ricky is a troubled orphan who has spent his childhood with a series of foster parents. Hec is his grizzled, oddball foster uncle. The two fall foul of the authorities and are compelled to escape together into the great New Zealand wilderness. The two rejected loners grow to be united against the authorities that hunt them down. “This big-hearted comedy- adventure movie is an off-kilter charmer, full of small, understated magic moments” The Guardian
Dec 7th SHOPLIFTERS
Hirokazu Kore-eda. Japan, 2018. 15
This winner of The Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival was inspired by a Tokyo newspaper report about a large family of thieves headed by a Fagin-like mastermind. However, the director avoids the lurid potential of such a story and instead gives us an intricate and nuanced family drama in the classical Japanese style. “It is a movie made up of delicate brushstrokes: details, moments, looks and smiles… a rich, satisfying and deeply intelligent film” – The Guardian
Jan 4th EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT
Ciro Guerra. Columbia, 2015. 12A
Strongly reminiscent of Fitzcarraldo and Apocalypse Now, Guerro’s extraordinary film uses two time frames to tell the stories of white explorers’ quests for the yakruna- a sacred plant said to have healing properties. Filmed in the Amazonia region of Columbia, Embrace of the Serpent is an art movie that grips like a thriller. “An anthropological adventure, character mystery and teemingly rich tribute to a lost world, Ciro Guerra’s monochrome heart-of-darkness fable is a stunner” – Sight and Sound
Jan 18th CAPERNAUM
Nadine Labaki. Lebanon, 2018. 15
Capernaum (which means chaos) is a powerful, heart-wrenching film about a Beirut street kid that makes a Ken Loach movie seem like a cheerful romp. Having run away from his abusive parents, and after many harrowing experiences on the streets, young Zain ends up in prison. There, enraged by his parents’ behaviour, he instigates legal action against them for giving birth to him. “The sorrow inherent in this tale would be unbearable without the film’s flashes of humor and performances by a cast of non-professionals that are moving beyond measure”-Rolling Stone
Feb 14th and 15th HNFS: 1980-2020
Cinema ParadisoWe’re screening five great films over two days to celebrate forty years of Hook Norton Film Society. Our festival includes a Saturday morning show for children. Our films for members all celebrate the role of films in our culture. Please see the insert in the HNFS brochure for more details.
Hail Caesar [trailer]
Day for Night [trailer]
Cinema Paradiso [trailer]
Special Children’s Screening: Horrid Henry the Movie [trailer]
The Red Balloon [trailer]
March 7th I’VE LOVED YOU SO LONG
Philippe Claudel. France/Canada, 2008. 12A
Two sisters, Juliette, and Leah are re-united for the first time in fifteen years.
When Juliette goes to live with Leah and her family, the truth gradually emerges: Juliette has been in prison for a crime so terrible that her parents tried to forget that she ever existed. “Kirstin Scott Thomas delivers the performance of her career, slowly inhabiting her character with vitality and warmth as she shrugs off the judgments of others and the grim shackles of her past.” – Empire magazine
March 21st THE DEATH OF STALIN
Armando Iannucci. UK, 2107. 15
When the tyrannical Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin drops dead, his sycophantic underlings engage in a frantic power struggle to be the next Soviet leader. Simon Russell Beale as Beria leads a distinguished cast in this highly entertaining dark political comedy. “Every gag in The Death of Stalin, is girded with fear. The humour is so black that it might have been pumped out of the ground” – The New Yorker
April 4th LEAVE NO TRACE
Debra Granik. USA, 2018. PG
The title of this highly praised film refers to the lifestyle of Will, an army veteran with PTSD and Thom, his 14 year old daughter; both live off -grid in a vast public park in Oregon, regularly moving camp to escape detection. Will is determined to maintain this survivalist existence forever but Thom is intrigued by her glimpses of normal life and likes what she sees. “A low-key drama about cultural and generational divides that is alternately gripping and melancholic, but always shot through with the unmistakable ring of truth” – The Guardian
April 18th DOUBLE INDEMNITY
Billy Wilder. USA, 1944 PG
Once more we close with a famous Hollywood classic. Starring Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray, Double Indemnity is possibly the most stylishly hard- boiled film noir of the entire genre: “No, I never loved you Walter — not you or anybody else. I’m rotten to the heart. I used you, just as you said. That’s all you ever meant to me. Until a minute ago, when I couldn’t fire that second shot.” Enjoy.
Double Indemnity