CINEMA: Anniversary Inverness Film Festival is just the ticket for Highland movie buffs with screenings at Eden Court and Cromarty and a treasure trove of hidden gems waiting to be discovered
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HIGHLAND film buffs have been thanked for their support of the local cinema scene ahead of a landmark anniversary festival previewed to a packed audience last night.
Inverness Film Festival marks its 20th anniversary next month with an impressive line-up ranging from star-studded, critically acclaimed movies to new world cinema, documentaries, shorts and a number o special events.
There's a Ross-shire flavour to the eagerly anticipated annual showcase with Cromarty Cinema featured in a number of screenings and a showing of Dingwall-born animator Will Anderson's collaboration with Ainslie Henderson, A Cat Called Dom.
Paul MacDonald-Taylor, Inverness Film Festival director and head of film and visual art at Eden Court, said he was delighted to see such a large turnout for the preview night adding that the cinemas' continued success was down to the support of people buying tickets.
He urged film fans to spread the word amongst friends and family about some of the gems due to be screened from November 4-10.
The full programme opens with James Gray’s Armageddon Time on Friday, November 4 and closing with Mark Mylod’s The Menu on Thursday, November 10.
Tickets for this year’s festival will be available from today (Wednesday, October 19).
The festival has screened around 500 feature films and 200 Scottish short films across two decades. Festival-goers can expect a typically wide-ranging seven-day programme of features, shorts and special events to mark the occasion.
This year’s opening film is James Gray’s deeply personal Armageddon Time, a coming-of-age story set against the backdrop of Reagan’s America, starring Anthony Hopkins, Anne Hathaway and Jeremy Strong. The festival will close with The Menu, an outlandishly twisty foodie thriller directed by Mark Mylod, starring Ralph Fiennes and Anya Taylor-Joy.
Highlights of this year’s programme include Timothée Chalamet in Luca Guadagnino’s transgressive horror romance Bones and All, Charlotte Wells’ stunning feature debut Aftersun (starring Normal People’s Paul Mescal) and the return of Joanna Hogg with The Eternal Daughter, a gothic drama which sees Tilda Swinton deliver a riveting dual performance as both an artist and her elderly mother.
The festival’s documentary offering begins with an exploration of our entanglement with North Sea oil in The Oil Machine, followed by an in-person discussion with director Emma Davie. Ephemeral sees Alastair Lee follow Guy Robertson and Greg Boswell to the peaks of some of Scotland’s most stunning climbs, while Oscar-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras celebrates photographer and activist Nan Goldin in All the Beauty and the Bloodshed.
The next generation of Scottish film talent is represented with a host of shorts, plus director Paul Morris will be in attendance with his boldly ambitious, micro-budget debut feature Angry Young Men, a coming-of-age gangland comedy. A Scottish classic will be back on the big screen this year, as author Jonathan Melville and actor Jimmy Yuill join the festival for a special event screening of Bill Forsyth’s Local Hero.
In international cinema, Jafar Panahi (currently imprisoned by the Iranian regime) returns with the urgent and defiant No Bears, in which Panahi mirrors his real-life predicament by playing a filmmaker working under the glare of suspicious eyes. The festival also offers new cinema from all corners of the globe, including Georgia (What Do We See When We Look At The Sky?), Bhutan (Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom), Bolivia (Utama) and Costa Rica (Clara Sola). Marginalised languages will enjoy some screen time with Alejandro Loayza Grisi’s stunning cinematic Quechua-language debut Utama, and Carla Simón’s highly-acclaimed Catalan-language Alcarràs, winner of the Golden Bear at the 2022 Berlinale.
A retrospective strand this year will celebrate some of the festival’s biggest crowd-pleasers from previous years, including the jaw-dropping space thriller Gravity, the Coen Brothers’ brutal and compelling No Country for Old Men, and IFF 2015 Audience Award-winner Brooklyn.
This year’s anniversary edition is also being marked with a specially commissioned design by local artist Jacqueline Briggs. The illustration features iconic characters from previous Inverness Film Festival films rising out of Eden Court’s distinct façade. Recognisable faces include Frances McDormand (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), Noomi Rapace (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo) and Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men).
Rebecca Holt, chief executive at Eden Court, said: “Last year I attended IFF as a punter whilst at Eden Court for my interview as chief executive. I remember being so impressed by the calibre and diversity of films IFF had to offer and feeling butterflies in my stomach at the possibility that I might get to be part of its future.
"Now I have the pleasure and privilege of being here in its 20 th year – and what a year it is. This festival is a celebration of IFF’s rich history and of Eden Court’s role as a home in the Highlands year-round in presenting the best international cinema. We can’t wait to welcome you for this very special IFF.”
Paul MacDonald-Taylor, Inverness Film Festival Director and Head of Film + Visual Art at Eden Court, said: “I vividly remember being in the projection box for the opening film of the first IFF, in 2003, in the main auditorium waiting for the speeches to finish before pressing the start button on the 35mm projector.
"Over the years we have played over 500 feature films and 200 Scottish short films. This year’s programme is one of the very best that we’ve put on. There’s always something special about discovering new films and directors at a film festival, before you’ve read or heard about them elsewhere. I can’t wait to share all these wonderful films with our audiences this November. Hope you can come along, sit back, relax and enjoy.”
See the full line-up at https://eden-court.co.uk/inverness-film-festival-2022
