Friday 16th June – THE QUIET GIRL
(2022: Cert.12: Drama: 95 mins)
Doors open 7.30pm / Programme starts 8pm
Cáit is a nine year old girl from an over-crowded, dysfunctional and impoverished family. Quietly struggling at school and at home, she has learnt to hide in plain sight from those around her. As summer arrives and her pregnant mother’s due date approaches, Cáit is sent to live with middle-aged farming relatives she’s never met before, not knowing when she will return home. She blossoms in their care but in their farmhouse, where there are meant to be no secrets, she discovers one….
Directed by Colm Bairéad, the film stars Catherine Clinch, Carrie Crowley and Andrew Bennett. Subtitled with dialogue in Gaelic and English, it was nominated for both an Oscar & BAFTA in this year’s awards.
“Oh my goodness, The Quiet Girl is a truly beautiful and deeply moving work of cinematic wonder” Matthew Bond, The Mail On Sunday
“A genuine work of art….one of the single most moving, heartfelt and heartbreaking movies from any country in the last decade”
David Fear, Rolling Stone magazine.
Tickets: £6 from Chorleywood Bookshop, online and at the door if still available.
Friday 19th May – A MAN CALLED OTTO
(2023: Cert.15: Comedy Drama: 125 mins)
Doors open 7.30pm / Programme starts 8pm
Otto Anderson is a grumpy retiree who no longer sees purpose in his life following the death of his wife. Otto is ready to end it all but his plans are interrupted when a lively young family moves in next door and he meets his match in quick-witted Marisol. She challenges him to see life differently, leading to an unlikely friendship that turns his world around.
Directed by Marc Foster, the film stars Tom Hanks, Mariana Treviño, Rachel Keller and Manuel Garcia-Rulfo.
“It’s a typically excellent lead performance, misanthropic yet good-hearted, Hanks finding and elevating the humanity in the character.”
John Nugent, Empire Magazine
“All but the most dogged sceptics will be charmed…”
Wendy Ide, The Observer
Friday 21st April – EMPIRE of LIGHT
(2022: Cert.15: Romantic Drama: 115 mins: racism, strong language, sex)
Doors open 7.30pm / Programme starts 8pm
The latest film from multi award-winning director and writer Sam Mendes, EMPIRE of LIGHT is a moving drama about the power of human connection during turbulent times.
Set in and around a faded art deco cinema in an English seaside town in the early 1980s, the story follows Hilary, the cinema’s manager who is struggling with her mental health, and Stephen, a new employee who longs to escape this provincial town in which he faces adversity on a daily basis.
EMPIRE of LIGHT stars Olivia Colman, Micheal Ward, Toby Jones, Colin Firth, Tom Brooke and Tanya Moodie.
“An engrossing, poignantly observed and beautifully acted drama about love, life and the fragile art of moviegoing…”
Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
“…a ferociously affecting performance by Colman…”
Tom Shone, The Sunday Times
Friday 17th March– Belfast
(2022: Drama: 97 mins: moderate threat, discrimination, infrequent strong language)
Doors open 7.30pm / Programme starts 8pm
Written and directed by Kenneth Branagh, BELFAST is a poignant story of love, laughter and loss in one boy’s childhood amid the music and social tumult of the late 1960s.
Nine year old Buddy and his family live in a largely Protestant district with a few Catholic families, but one day his community and everything he thought he understood about life is suddenly turned upside down. His family gets caught in the mayhem and must decide to stay or leave the only place they have ever called home.
Through it all, his passionate parents (Caitríona Balfe & Jamie Dornan) and quick-witted grandparents (Judy Dench & Ciarán Hinds) keep the joy alive through music and the magic of movies in this feel-good story that reminds us that no matter how far you go, you never forget where you came from.
“A bewitchingly intimate, warm-hearted, wholly captivating film…” Brian Viner, Daily Mail
“…engaging, tender film-making which tugs at the heart-strings..” Fionnuala Halligan,Screen International
Friday 17th February – The Lost King
(2022: Cert. 12: Comedy Drama: 108 mins: Mild Bad Language)
After having been lost for over 500 years, the remains of King Richard III were discovered beneath a car park in Leicester in 2012. The search had been orchestrated by an amateur historian, Philippa Langley, whose unrelenting research had been met with incomprehension by her friends and family and with scepticism by experts and academics.
The LOST KING is the life-affirming true story of a woman who refused to be ignored and who took on the country’s most eminent historians, forcing them to think again about one of the most controversial kings in England’s history.
Directed by Stephen Frears, the film stars Sally Hawkins, Steve Coogan, Harry Lloyd, James Fleet and Mark Addy.
“A warm, wryly amusing account of a real-life story…”
Wendy Ide, Screen International“…an underdog story that proves a perfect vehicle for Hawkins’s reliably winning screen presence.” Mark Kermode, The Guardian
Friday 20th January – Mrs Harris Goes To Paris (PG)
Doors open 7.30pm / Programme starts 8pm
A heartwarming and humorous tale of a woman daring to follow her dreams.
The film stars Lesley Manville, as Ada Harris, a widowed cleaning lady in 1950s London who becomes obsessed with the idea of owning a Christian Dior dress. Having worked, scrimped and saved to raise the money, she embarks on an adventure to Paris in pursuit of her dream. The trip will not only change her own outlook but the very future of the House of Dior itself….
Directed by Anthony Fabian, it also stars Isabelle Huppert, Lambert Wilson, Jason Isaacs, Alba Baptista, Lucas Bravo and Ellen Thomas.
The Chorleywood Film Club 