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Charlotte Film Society: Contemplation, craziness

By Lawrence Toppman
ltoppman@charlotteobserver.com
Lawrence Toppman
Lawrence Toppman is a theater critic and culture writer with The Charlotte Observer.
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- Courtesy: Le Pacte
A newly elected pontiff (Michel Piccoli, center) isn't sure he wants the job after all in "We Have a Pope."

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  • Charlotte Film Society

    Saturday Night Cine Club movies are 7:30 p.m. at Theatre Charlotte, 501 Queens Road.

    Memberships: $10. They get you $5 admissions at Cine Club or Back Alley Film Series; $1 discounts at Manor, Park Terrace or Ballantyne Village cinemas; and every fifth rental free at VisArt Video. (Nonmembers pay $8 to see Cine Club and Back Alley films.)

    Details: Join at Cine Club or Back Alley events or www.charlottefilmsociety.org.


Europhiles among us may rejoice: Saturday Night Cine Club, which holds monthly screenings at Theatre Charlotte, has announced a January-June lineup for 2013, and it’s all coming from Europe: France, Hungary, Italy, Spain, Russia and France again.

But before I describe it, I’ll mention two more imminent entries from Charlotte Film Society’s other arm: Back Alley Film Series, which runs at Carolina Cinemas Crownpoint. Those two come from some alternate universe.

BAFS will import two rediscovered movies, the 1987 “Miami Connection” and the 1971 “Wake in Fright.”

The martial arts “Miami” runs Monday. It was directed by black belt/philosopher/author Y.K. Kim and tells of the synth rock band Dragon Sound, as it “embarks on a roundhouse wave of crime-crushing justice in the streets of Orlando.”

The thriller “Wake,” a seminal film in Australian cinema, runs Dec. 17. It comes from director Ted Kotcheff and tells of a British schoolteacher’s demoralization at the hands of drunken derelicts, while he’s stranded in a small town in the outback.

Now, back to normality. Here’s the early 2013 roster:

• Jan. 19: “The Well Digger’s Daughter.” Daniel Auteuil directs and stars as a widower with six daughters in the Provence countryside. The eldest gets impregnated by a pilot, who quickly flies off to the skies of World War I.

• Feb. 23: “The Turin Horse.” Béla Tarr and Ágnes Hranitzky co-directed this film about a rural farmer confronting the mortality of a faithful horse, whose ill-treatment partly caused Friedrich Nietzsche to sink into lunacy.

• March 16: “We Have a Pope.” Nanni Moretti directed this drama about a newly elected pontiff (Michel Piccoli) who’s reluctant to take on that job and agrees to see a therapist to understand why.

• April 13: “Even the Rain.” Two Spanish filmmakers go to rural Bolivia to shoot a movie about Columbus’ journey to the New World, then get embroiled in a Bolivian rebellion against the privatization of the water supply. Spain’s Icíar Bollaín directed.

• May 11: “Elena.” The title character hopes to get money for her irresponsible son’s family by making a second marriage to a millionaire, but she finds out he’s leaving all his dough to his spendthrift daughter. Andrey Zvyagintsev (“The Return”) directed.

• June 8: “All Together.” Jane Fonda appears in her first French-speaking role in 40 years. She, Geraldine Chaplin and Claude Rich live in communal ease with a younger caretaker (Daniel Brühl), until old secrets and jealousies emerge. Stéphane Robelin directed this comedy.

Toppman: 704-358-5232

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