As usual, we start early this Sunday; we'll be there at 4.15 to offer you a glass of wine to celebrate the New Year and to swap your Christmas stories with each other. It will also give you the chance to join the club if you haven't already done so - £7 gets you a pound off all films (INCLUDING the Festival in February!) - and give you the chance to buy a Spring Season Pass if you want one - £28 gets you in to all 13 films until Easter.
Our season starts at 5.00 with 'Margaret', an unusual starter for us in that it is from the USA, and one of those films that has 'got away'. It is a thought provoking film and has an amazing performance from its lead actor - Anna Paquin. Without giving too much away, the film shows Lisa, a spoilt 17 year old, whose thoughtless action at the start has terrible consequences. We follow her trying to come to terms with these consequences, and trying to make up for them. As Peter Bradshaw said in the Guardian 'the resulting movie is stunning: provocative and brilliant, a sprawling neurotic nightmare of urban catastrophe, with something of John Cassavetes and Tom Wolfe, and rocket-fuelled by a superbly thin-skinned performance by Anna Paquin'.
You will have noticed that it is called Margaret not Lisa; you will have to see the film to find out why...