Forest Row Film Society

Over the last few days we held our silent film weekend, which was a complete joy. Four very wonderful films from the 1920s were served up, three with live music, and all received audience scores over 90, which means that half of our top ten-rated films this season to date are silents.

Unfortunately, I think the snow deterred a few people on the Saturday night and Sunday, though the cold weather and partially broken heating in the village hall was rather fitting for the Saturday matinee screening of The Great White Silence. Nevertheless, we all marvelled at the films and the most wonderful music. Terry Davies on piano is always extremely sensitive to the mood of the film, but this weekend he demonstrated that repeatedly, and for a variety of different genres. Most impressive of all was the music that he and Anna Cooper (violin/viola) performed for The Passion of Joan of Arc, a difficult film music-wise, since so little happens, and so slowly.

Various members of the committee provided introductions to the films, giving context about the films, and also their subject matter. Thanks also to the wonderful group of volunteers who provided cakes and refreshments. It was one of the most magical film weekends I’ve ever been to.

From 3-5 February there will be four stunning films from the 1920s screened in Forest Row, East Sussex.

Silent films with live music have always been very popular with audiences of the award-winning community cinema, Forest Row Film Society, which has encouraged us to extend our programming of these amazing films over a whole weekend.

Most will feature live music by Olivier-award-winning composer Terry Davies, and the weekend starts on Friday 3 February with arguably the first and best vampire film: Murnau’s Nosferatu. With its expressionist aesthetic and Max Schreck as Count Orlok, it has been described as “a brooding chamber piece of gothic ruminations and occult imagery, of the flickering light of the world waging a losing battle against the overwhelming darkness.” It’s essential viewing, even if you don’t normally like “horror”.

The following day (Saturday 4 February), Forest Row Village Hall will host two films. The first is the magnificent new restoration of The Great White Silence, the official film of the ill-fated Scott Antarctic expedition of 1912. Herbert Ponting’s remarkable film is a very moving testimony to the courage of Scott and his team, and is timed to coincide with the centenary of their reaching the South Pole on 17 January 1912. The film will be screened with the evocative new score by Simon Fisher Turner, using found sounds, and introduced by Jan Faull, film archivist at the British Film Institute.

Saturday evening is filled with a rare screening of Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc. With its stunning imagery and close-ups, Dreyer’s film is an incredible depiction of faith, suffering, and redemption. Drawing on the transcripts of the original trial, it is Joan’s pain and anguish that is its main focus, with Maria Falconetti giving one of the greatest performances ever recorded on film. Unsurprisingly, it has been described as “one of the most staggeringly intense films ever made. … it’s magisterial cinema, and almost unbearably moving.”

Finally, Sunday afternoon (5 February) brings The Adventures of Prince Achmed, the first animated feature film, made between 1923-6 by Lotte Reiniger. Loosely based on A Thousand and One Nights, this beautiful and beguiling film uses extremely fine-detailed silhouettes to tell its story.

Venue: Forest Row Village Hall

Local accommodation: Brambletye Hotel

More information: Programme and Further Reading

Contact: forestrowfilms@yahoo.co.uk

After each film we get you to rate the film, and here are the collated scores for the season. If you have any other feedback about any of the films, you can post them here too.

It is really useful for us to get your feedback since it gives us a great sense of how good our programming is, and helps us plan for next season.

How do we convert your rating into a score? You can read the simple outline of how it works on the BFFS site [pdf].

The scores for 2011-12

What do you think we should screen next season? Every year we’re keen to get your input into our programming, and would like your input.

We’re looking for excellent, non-mainstream films that could attract a hundred people, so let us know your ideas and why you think it would be a good choice. Our programme is a mix of recent and classic films from all over the world, including some little-known films; we’re also on the look-out for great shorts as well, or films with some sort of local interest. As a rule, we don’t tend to show films that have been screened locally in the recent past, or which have have been on TV recently, though that’s not a hard and fast rule.

You may also like to look at the list of films that were suggested last year or for the 2009-10 season. We do keep reviewing the lists of previously-suggested films too; just because we haven’t shown them yet doesn’t mean we never will!

Forest Row Film Society was awarded the prize for Best Film Programming in the 2011 awards at the Institut Francais in London during the BFFS National Conference for Community Cinemas and Film Society of the Year Awards 2011.

In an incredibly busy weekend, the delegates had the chance to see a great clutch of films, take part in some fascinating conference sessions, and listen to Ed Vaizey’s keynote speech. As Minister for Culture (etc) he is the member of government who is directly responsible for cinema and (from our point of view, most importantly) community-based, grassroots film screenings.

The conference sessions are always really valuable, and help to give us pointers and strategic focus to our activities as a community cinema. This year, the sessions focussed on volunteering, and we had a chance to think about how to encourage, direct and value all the volunteer efforts that sustain a community cinema cinema like ours. The big challenge with the weekend, though, is that you can’t be everywhere at once, since there are very enticing film screenings there as well…

The most well-received film of the weekend was Le Herisson (The Hedgehog), directed by Mona Achache. Based on the best-selling novel The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery, it received a monumental audience reaction score of 96.7, and must be a very strong contender for next season (ie 2012-13!). The film stars Josiane Balasko, and the charming, UK-based Japanese actor, Togo Igawa, who was also the guest presenter at the Film Society of the Year Awards on the Saturday night, and took part in a Q&A session after the screening of the film.

Patrick Crawford and Brad Scott receiving the Best Film Programming award from Togo Igawa. Photo: Ivan Lieman Photography

The full awards list is on the BFFS website [pdf], and illustrates what an incredibly inspiring range of activities film societies and community cinemas encompass. We were delighted to come away with two awards, but also very conscious that there is a huge amount of expertise out there that we must learn from; receiving an award is rather humbling, and certainly can’t induce any complacency. If anything, it makes you realise that you need to raise your game even further!

The competition was really quite fierce, and the judges had elected to make several of the awards to two organisations this year. The first such was the award for Best Film Programming, which was awarded to both Forest Row Film Society and Bracknell Film Society. The judges look for the range and balance of films, as well as audience involvement in programming; last year we covered a huge and novel range, including the comedy film festival, the ongoing and exciting relationship with Transition Forest Row, and a number of other special events, which no doubt made a major contribution to the award. It is certainly true that, without the collaborations with other groups it is unlikely we would have won the award. A number of the films in the programme were also suggested by members, via the website, email and Facebook. We really appreciate all our members’ submissions and are embarrassed that we just can’t show them all. The Best Film Programming award is one we can all be justly proud of, and owes much to the hard work of the entire committee, the film festival committee, and Mike Grenville of Transition Forest Row. You can read our complete submission on our website.

Photo: Ivan Lieman Photography

The second award was one of the new prize categories this year. Recognising that it is the work of a large number of individuals that actually realises the success of all community cinemas, the BFFS have instituted a Award for an Outstanding Contribution by an Individual. Seven such awards were made this year, including a special mention for Forest Row Film Society’s Brad Scott. Finally, the big prize, the Film Society of the Year was awarded to the rather wonderful and inspiring Swindon Film Society.

Among the numerous films on offer over the weekend we caught The Way of the Morris, a new documentary notionally about morris dancing, but which is much broader in its scope than that. It is a very sensitive film about England, Englishness, the FirstWorld War, community, class and identity. And some beer. It would be ideal for the 2012 Forest Row Festival.

The other really impressive film was Sound it Out, a documentary about the last remaining independent record shop in NE England. Again, really sensitively made, about the customers and their stories, touching on regional poverty, job losses and the importance of music in people’s lives, it has creatively used crowd-sourced funding to enable the film to be completed, taken to the SXSW festival, and is now seeking a small amount of funding via indiegogo to better enable its distribution.

So, in short, an exhilarating weekend, and one which raises the bar for next year. We still have so much to learn. Come along and join in the journey…

Check out the proofs of our new season’s programme [pdf]. We have a great selection of films coming up, including six silents, a new strand of matinees for a younger audience, plus the Transition Forest Row collection. We hope you’ll agree it is a particularly exciting range of things to watch over the next year.

We’ll be updating the website with the full details over the next week, so this is just to whet your appetite.

Thank you to everyone who sent us ideas and suggestions; as ever it has been really hard to choose and to create an interesting and balanced programme. Let us know what you think of the final choices, and keep an eye out for the printed programmes around the village in the next couple of weeks.

What have been your favourite films this season? You can vote for as many as you want.

If you want to give us any other feedback on the season or on specific films, please add them in the comments box below the form. Thank you!

Just like last year, we’d like some suggestions for what to screen next season.

We’re looking for ideas that could entice a hundred people to the village hall, so please let us know why you think any films you suggest might fit the bill. A good portion of the ideas for films in this year’s programme came from people outside the committee, so we do listen!

We’re looking to finalise the programme by April, though hope to have most of it mapped out sell before then, so now’s the time to get thinking.

After last night’s packed screening of Dreyer’s emotionally wrenching Ordet, it is worth circulating a few articles and other pieces that you might be interested in reading. Though Dreyer is one of those film-makers spoken of in the same breath as Tarkovsky and Ozu, his films are probably seen less frequently. Indeed, it was certainly the first time many of the audience last night had seen any of his work.

The Danish Film Institute has a fantastic site devoted to Dreyer and his work, including a section on Ordet. The site also includes interviews and film clips, including (1) interviews with Jørgen Roos and Preben Lerdorff Rye and (2) Birgitte Federspiel and cinematographer Henning Bendtsen, both about Ordet. There is also a documentary The Word and the Light made in 2001 by Helga C. Theilgaard which is on the Danish Film Institute site.

In addition, you might like to read a useful overview of his work in Senses of Cinema. Strictly Film School provide insights into all the major films, and Jonathan Rosenbaum’s article on Dreyer is essential reading.

We’d be interested to know what you thought of the film; there was certainly more discussion about it in the pub afterwards than for any other film we’ve screened recently.

These were the films screened at the special preview weekend organised by the Independent Cinema Office (ICO) at BFI Southbank on 17-19 April.

• Bad Lieutenant: Werner Herzog, 2009, 121 min
• Bronco Bullfrog: Barney Platts-Mills, 1969, 86 min
• Cléo from 5 to 7: Agnès Varda, 1962, 90 min
• The Concert: Radu Mihaileanu, 2009, 119 min
• Four Lions: Christopher Morris, 2009
• Gainsbourg: Joann Sfar, 2010, 130 min
• The Killer Inside Me: Michael Winterbottom, 210, 110 min
• Lebanon: Maoz Shmulik, 2009, 92 min
• Metropolis: Fritz Lang, 1927
• Mother:  Joon-ho Bong, 2009, 128 min
• Rashomon: Akira Kurosawa, 1950, 88 min
• The Runaways: Floria Sigismondi, 2010, 105 min
• Sammy Going South: Alexander Mackendrick, 1963, 118 min
• Samson and Delilah: Warwick Thornton, 2009, 101 min
• The Secrets in Their Eyes: Juan José Campanella, 2009, 156 min
• Shed Your Tears and Walk Away: Jez Lewis, 2009, 90 min
• A Town Called Panic: Vincent Patar, Stéphane Aubier, 2009, 75 min
• The Vintner’s Luck: Niki Caro, 2009, 120 min
• Whatever Works: Woody Allen, 2009, 92min
• When You’re Strange: Tom DiCillo, 2009, 88 min
• White Material: Claire Denis, 2009, 100 min
• Wild Grass: Alain Resnais, 2009, 104 min