New Film Screenings coming up from Minicine

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The last screening in our current film programme takes place this Thursday (June 27th) so we’ve been busy putting together the line up for the next three months and wanted to let you all know what to expect from West Yorkshire’s smallest award-winning* film society and community cinema.

First things first, this Thursday we return to Armley Mills Industrial Museum‘s cosy 26-seater Palace Picturehouse for an evening of glorious animation.

Our feature film this month is the award-winning Persepolis (2007), directed by Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud, and adapted from Satrapi’s autobiographical graphic novel of the same name.

Persepolis follows ‘Marji’ growing up in Tehran becoming aware of the escalating political situation that would lead to the Iranian Revolution. Fearing for their daughter’s safety, Marji’s parents end her to Austria to finish her studies and avoid the country’s struggles. She struggles to accept/be accepted by The West and after failing to find her place, physically and spiritually, she returns to Iran and is faced with the same issues of isolation and exclusion.

Persepolis won the Jury Prize at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, losing out to Pixar’s Ratatouille. Empire Magazine also included it in it’s list of The 100 Best Films of World Cinema.

Accompanying our feature presentation we will also have a selection of animated shorts for your viewing pleasure and refreshment will be available upon arrival.

Please note that on the night we will be screening the original French language version of Persepolis with English subtitles.

And it’s probably about time we announced our next selection of films to be screened from July to September, right? Well here goes:

Next month we head to New Zealand with the Niki Caro directed Whale Rider (2002). Paikea’s birth was foreseen as the arrival of a traditional Maori tribe’s future leader, but she wasn’t a he. 12 years later Pai’s grandfather and current Chief is still searching for a successor and Pai is determined to prove her worth, regardless of gender.

Whale Rider won the World Cinema Audience award at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival and the sensational Keisha Castle-Hughes (Pai) was nominated for a Academy Award the same year.

In August our feature will be Mike Figgis’ Timecode (2000), an experimental film shot in real-time and presented in four camera split-screen.

British-born Figgis (Leaving Las Vegas) has become a pioneer of digital filmmaking over the years, fully embracing its flexibility and accessibility.

The film consists of four takes, shot simultaneously on four separate cameras and follows an ensemble of people in LA as they prepare for an upcoming film shoot.

The film was shot 15 times over a two week period with the best version being released theatrically.

From digital filmmaking, which has come to define cinema in the 21st century, we revisit the roots of celluloid cinema in September with a screening of The General (1926).

Originally deemed a critical and box office failure upon its release The General has gone on to become heralded as one the greatest films of all time, eventually finding its way onto the United States National Film Registry in 1989.

Starring silent film legend Buster Keaton, railway engineer Johnnie must track down his stolen locomotive, The General of the title, during the chaos of the U.S. Cival War.

You can find details of all upcoming screenings at our Coming Soon page over on the Minicine website and tickets can be purchased from our online box office as and when they become available.

If you haven’t been to a Minicine at the Mills screening yet we begin each event with a selection of short films and provide refreshment on arrival, usually in the form of tea, coffee and some of the tastiest homemade cake, all tailored to compliment our feature presentation to make the night feel all that more enjoyable.

We hope to see you at a screening soon!

*Last year Minicine received the British Federation of Film Societies’ award for Best Film Programming.