Shame - Sunday 11th March 5pm

This weekend we have one of the highlights of the season for you - Steve McQueen's Shame.

McQueen's first film - Hunger - was a hard hitting look at the IRA hunger strikers, showing the anger and sadness on both sides of the divided Ireland. I, for one, have been looking forward to his follow up ever since and, judging from the critical acclaim, the world has been too...

"Steve McQueen's follow-up to Hunger is an icily compulsive portrait of damaged siblings and sex addiction, fuelled by brilliant performances by Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan" - Peter Bradshaw, Guardian...

"McQueen's film is breathtaking in its execution. Fassbender delivers his finest performance yet. Why he hasn't received the expected Oscar remains a mystery."- Ed Gibbs, Sun Herald

That said, a word of warning. This is an '18' rated movie whose subject matter is sex addiction. Dont expect pornography, but do expect explicit detail. This is one of the best films of 2011, but... "Shame is interested in the stark immediacy of one man’s world and drawing us into that world without easy explanations" - Dave Calhoun, Time Out.

Vaughan

Shorts Night - Sunday 4th March 5pm

We have what might be a first for the club; an evening of short films. After the success of the Osprey Awards at the Festival, we thought we should show more shorts at the club nights; they are not just films made by people who can't afford to make a full length film! If you want to see what can be done with almost no time to develop a theme, come along and see the winner of the Virgin Media Shorts Competition, for instance - how to make a thriller in just over 2 minutes! (Cleverly call '2:20' so no prizes for the actual length...)

We have a variety of films, some local, some international, some award winners, some we just liked; come and see for yourself what these directors of a different sort can do. The full list can be seen in the programme notes (pdf).

13th Keswick Film Festival - 23rd-26th February

I'm sure you need no reminding that the 13th Keswick Film Festival starts on Thursday evening with the party for pass holders and a screening of In Love With Alma Cogan followed by a Q&A session with its director Tony Britten. There are lots of other films over the weekend and more premieres and pre-releases than ever before (I think!).

We're delighted to welcome back the Lancaster Millennium Choir on Saturday evening. Tony Palmer will talking about his epic adaptation of Wagner (showing all day Sunday) and Bird On A Wire (Sat 10pm), plus teenage actor Alex Etal will be on hand for questions at the family screening of Ways To Live Forever.

Of course we're really excited to be joined by John Hurt throughout the festival. If you need a reminder of why you should be excited just take a look at this wonderful video:

Post Mortem - Sunday 19th February 5pm

The Pope's Toilet - Sunday 11th February 5pm

We stay in Latin America for Sunday's offering, The Pope's Toilet, set in Uruguay. According to the Evening Standard,

This small but perfectly formed Uruguayan comedy from César Charlone and Enrique Fernández has the fetching Cesar Troncoso as Beto, a financially strapped petty smuggler from the small town of Melo near the Brazilian border, who hopes the Pope’s 1988 visit will provide his wife and daughter with financial succour as well as the appropriate blessing.

Though this is a comedy, it is also shrewd and humane about its peasant characters, painting the leading character’s wife and solemn little daughter (the marvellous Virginia Ruiz) who wants to be a radio announcer rather than a seamstress, with real sympathy. It’s charming in a proper way, entirely avoiding sentiment and, with Olivier Assayas’s Summer Hours, can be counted one of the best films in town.