Season Eighteen Films
(2023/24)
Download Season Eighteen Programme
7 November 2023
Mrs Harris goes to Paris
UK, Canada, France, Hungary, Belgium (2022) 111 mins; Dir: Anthony Fabian; Stars: Lesley Manville, Ellen Thomas, Rose Williams
Mrs Harris Goes to Paris movingly weaves a tale about finding an outer beauty that reflects the purity of heart within. Lesley Manville is on excellent form in a sweet-natured Cinderella tale about a cleaner on a mission to buy a Dior dress.
5 December 2023
The Sting
USA (1973) 124 mins; Dir: George Roy Hill; Stars: Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Robert Shaw
Paul Newman and Robert Redford star in this Oscar winning and convoluted caper made at the crest of the Hollywood new wave. Celebrating its 50th Anniversary, it could be the most complicated brainteaser ever to reach blockbuster and major awards status.
2 January 2024
Double Indemnity
USA (1944) 108 mins; Dir: Billy Wilder; Stars: Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, Edward G. Robinson
Heartbreak in this classy film noir about an insurance salesman. A dark, tautly constructed adaptation of James M. Cain's novel -- penned by Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler -- Double Indemnity continues to set the standard for the best in this genre.
6 February 2024
Barbie
USA, UK (2023) 114 mins; Dir: Greta Gerwig; Stars: Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, Issa Rae
Greta Gerwig serves up a frothy confection of fashion and fun coupled with searing social critique of the iconic doll. In a world where blockbuster films are surrounded by digital landscapes, Barbie's devotion to practical production is outstanding. Gerwig's pink, plastic epic is infused with its director's indie spirit and far more cognizant of the toy's complicated legacy than you might expect.
"Promulgates ideas and beliefs that are alien to Kuwaiti society and public order" Kuwaiti Ministry of Information
5 March 2024
Empire of Light
UK, USA (2022) 115 mins; Dir: Sam Mendes; Stars: Olivia Colman, Micheal Ward, Colin Firth, Toby Jones
Olivia Colman and Micheal Ward pursue a bittersweet workplace romance in this lovely, personal film illuminating tiny splices of life. Mendes brings magic to the employees of the Empire where a real cinema that had fallen into disrepair was restored to its former magnificence and used as the location.
2 April 2024
The Whale
USA (2022) 117 mins; Dir: Darren Aronofsky; Stars: Brendan Fraser, Sadie Sink, Ty Simpkins
The Oscar-nominated star plays a chronically obese man in Darren Aronofsky's clammy, uncomfortable but ultimately redeeming movie. "The Whale" is a deeply moving story about redemption, loss, and trauma.
7 May 2024
All Quiet on the Western Front
Germany, UK, USA (2022) 147 mins; Dir: Edward Berger; Stars: Felix Kammerer, Albrecht Schuch, Aaron Hilmer
The Bafta frontrunner gives Remarque's great novel a sumptuous treatment, turning it into the Teutonic equivalent of 1917. The First World War is reimagined as a symphony of mud, teen angst and terrible beauty.
4 June 2024
Asteroid City
USA, Germany (2023) 105 mins; Dir: Jason Schwartzman, Scarlett Johansson, Tom Hanks
The writer-director's knowing meta-tale set in a space-obsessed 1950s desert town has a starry cast and meticulous attention to detail. Following a writer on his world-famous fictional play about a grieving father who travels with his tech-obsessed family to small rural Asteroid City to compete in a junior stargazing event, only to have his world view disrupted forever.
2 July 2024
A Haunting in Venice
USA, UK, Italy (2023) 103 mins; Dir: Kenneth Branagh; Stars: Kenneth Branagh, Kelly Reilly, Michelle Yeoh
In post-World War II Venice, Poirot, now retired and living in his own exile, reluctantly attends a seance. But when one of the guests is murdered, it is up to the former detective to once again uncover the killer. The former detective is thrust into a sinister world of shadows and secrets. Based upon the novel Halloween Party by Agatha Christie but in a totally different setting.