new irish cinema
may 28 -- june 10, 1999
photo: THE CRYING GAME
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coming times: new irish cinema may 28 -- june 10, 1999 photo: THE CRYING GAME |
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calendar Featuring Irish films released between 1994 and the present, Coming Times reflects the co- presenters' ongoing interest in this rapidly expanding national cinema and is part of a larger Irish arts celebration on the occasion of Ireland House's fifth anniversary. (For information, call 998-3950.) Coming Times continues In the Name of the Nation: A Celebration of Irish Filmmaking 1916 to the Present, the first comprehensive chronological survey of Irish cinema in the U.S. (presented by the Film Society and the Irish Film Institute in 1994). Showcasing today's sharp, wide-ranging Irish visions, our second Irish program shines with stellar Irish actors--Stephen Rea, Liam Neeson, Brendan Gleeson, Gabriel Byrne, Donal Donnelly, Richard Harris (and son Jared), Brenda Fricker, John Lynch et al.--spiced with a few honorary Gaels like Beverly D'Angelo and Ian Richardson. The movies drive from dreams into the mundane, from the realm of the imagination into cutting-edge socio-political/emotional experiences, and especially explore the fluid, sometimes lethal geography of contemporary Irish family life. Veteran and first-time directors--New York's Jimmy Smallhorne, Gillies (Hideous Kinky) MacKinnon, Thaddeus O'Sullivan (whose powerful December Bride opened our first Irish series), Cathal Black et al.--look into Ireland's past and future, to take the measure of changing Irish character at home and abroad. In titling the series Coming Times, we mean to snapshot Irish filmmaking in fast-motion transition--evolving and sometimes exploding into new forms.
Special Events: At Ireland House, on June 6 at 2 pm, a panel discussion including director Neil Jordan, Nicholas O'Neill, producer of CRUSH PROOF; Sheila Pratschke, Director of the Irish Film Institute; Paul Power, Managing Editor, the Independent Film and Video Monthly; Johnny Gogan, director of THE LAST BUS HOME; series curator Kathleen Murphy and others TBA) will inquire into the Irishness of Irish cinema as well as its future directions.
Barnes and Noble Lincoln Square Special Event: A tribute to director Neil Jordan, featuring his superb Irish films: ANGEL, THE MIRACLE, THE COMPANY OF WOLVES, THE CRYING GAME, MICHAEL COLLINS, THE BUTCHER BOY. Mr. Jordan joins us as guest of honor. David Thomson praises Jordan as "a master of both the shabby, neglected provinces and the dreamy cityscape...[his ability] to present strong women and weak men, without having his own personality threatened; and [his] Maupassant-like taste for consequences that is torn between being unexpected and giving warning hints of destiny or fate." Film Comment magazine recently named Mr. Jordan "an outlaw artist not yet tamed into formula, still not broken to the box-office yoke. Possessed of that rare Irish gift for dark, wicked poetry, Jordan keeps reaching further than he can always grasp--tempting us with his strange fruit, for our wisdom and pleasure." May's Movies for Kids are from Ireland. Rare Hollywood one-sheets, stills and lobby cards--celebrating the presence of Irish actors in Hollywood--are exhibited during Coming Times: New Irish Cinema in the Frieda and Roy Furman Gallery at the Walter Reade Theater. |
