Download - Filmhouse Cinema Edinburgh

4 New releases
CARNAGE
SHAME
THE WOMAN IN THE FIFTH
NEWRELEASE NEWRELEASE NEWRELEASE
Carnage
Showing from Fri 3 February
Roman Polanski • France/Germany/Poland 2011 • 1h20m
Digital projection • 15 – Contains strong language
Cast: Jodie Foster, Kate Winslet, Christoph Waltz, John C Reilly.
Polanski turns his attention to the satirical skewering of the
hypocrisies of the middle classes with this crisp adaptation
of playwright Yasmina Reza’s ‘The God of Carnage’.
Following a fight between their children, two New York
couples come together to discuss the unfortunate event.
Zachary, the son of Nancy and Alan (Kate Winslet and
Christoph Waltz) has bashed his schoolmate Ethan with
a stick, breaking a couple of his teeth. Ethan’s parents
Penelope and Michael (Jodie Foster and John C Reilly) have
called the tête-à-tête at their home, but what starts out as
a civilised attempt at resolution turns uglier by degrees. As
coffee and cobbler give way to hard liquor, surface niceties
start to slip, the couples get to sniping, then to arguing and
worse, and soon the fractures in their own relationships are
showing. Watching the foursome descend into behaviour
far worse than that of their children is horrible and funny,
often both at the same time.
Tightly scripted and confidently directed, with resonances
that go beyond its Brooklyn walls, Carnage is also a
terrific showcase for the remarkable performances of
its heavyweight ensemble cast. – Sandra Hebron, LFF
programme
AUDIODESCRIPTION/SUBTITLES
See page two for details.
Shame
Showing until Thu 9 February
Steve McQueen • UK 2011 • 1h41m • Digital projection
18 – Contains strong sex and sex references
Cast: Michael Fassbender, Carey Mulligan, James Badger Dale,
Amy Hargreaves, Nicole Beharie.
Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan star in Steve
McQueen’s frank study of a man’s sexual compulsion.
Brandon (Michael Fassbender) is in his thirties, living and
working in New York. He’s single, smart, and attractive,
has his own flat and a job in a glossy corporate office. He
also has a compulsive sexual need that sees him caught
up in a repetitive cycle of pick-ups, prostitutes and online
encounters. Whether he’s managing his sex life or it’s
managing him is open to question, but his world seems
self-contained and ordered, free of any messy emotional
ties. However, when his wayward younger sister Sissy
(Carey Mulligan) arrives at his apartment begging to stay,
Brandon’s control starts to slip...
In Shame, director Steve McQueen (Hunger) has made a
confident and complex second feature about the nature
of need and desire. Michael Fassbender, working with
McQueen for a second time, is perfect as a man whose
near-obsessive behaviour hints at some hidden past; and
Carey Mulligan is a well-chosen sparring partner, bringing
emotional depth to the flaky and clearly damaged Sissy.
– Sandra Hebron, LFF programme
AUDIODESCRIPTION/SUBTITLES
See page two for details.
The Woman in the Fifth
La femme du Vème
Fri 17 Feb to Thu 1 Mar
Pawel Pawlikowski • France/Poland/UK 2011
1h25m • Digital projection
15 – Contains strong language and infrequent gory images
Cast: Ethan Hawke, Kristin Scott Thomas, Joanna Kulig, Samir
Guesmi, Delphine Chuillot.
Although the radiant and, in this instance, manifestly
mysterious Kristin Scott Thomas is the titular woman in
Paris’ fifth arrondissement, this intriguing psychological
thriller from Pawel Pawlikowski (My Summer of Love) really
belongs to Ethan Hawke as Tom Ricks, a blocked novelist
who’s returned to the city to make amends to his ex-wife
and reconnect with his six-year-old daughter. His ex slams
the door in his face and calls the police, alerting us to the
fact that we may not be getting the whole story just yet, a
feeling that only grows after Tom is robbed, forced to take
refuge in a seedy hotel, and offered shady employment by
the fleapit’s proprietor. Reality slips another notch when
the stylish Margit (Scott Thomas), a translator who beds
Tom and encourages his writing, begins to play a more
sinister role in the increasingly unhinged novelist’s life.
Pawlikowski films the underbelly of Paris with a precision
that makes the much-photographed city appear wholly
new and much less than enticing, a vision perfectly aligned
to a story that is as dark as it is disquietingly menacing.