NEWS
Davidson Film Club Announces its 21st Film Series
In January the Davidson Film Club will begin its 21st series (11th year) of critically acclaimed international films. This series will include six remarkable films from France, the UK, Norway, Bhutan, Bulgaria, and Indonesia (see brief descriptions below). Each film club event includes the screening of a film in the Armour Street Theatre in Davidson, followed by discussion led by a knowledgeable guest presenter. All of our events are scheduled on a Saturday evening (7 p.m.), once a month.
Memberships are now open for the new series. Members are all those who subscribe to the whole series of six films. We are maintaining our low ticket price for members at $42 for the series, that is, $7 per film.
We are also keeping the walk-in ticket price for individual films at $9. Walk-ins, who are very welcome, will need to continue reserving their seats in advance (see information on the home page of our website) so that we are sure to be able to accommodate them.
The Davidson Film Club website has been updated with the new schedule from January to June, 2023, and descriptions of all the films, which we are also including below in this announcement.
The PayPal buttons on our home page have been reactivated so that people can subscribe using their credit card. PLEASE NOTE: The button on the LEFT is for a single membership at $42; the button on the RIGHT is for a couple at $84, for your convenience. It is easy to confuse the buttons, so please be careful!
For those who prefer to pay by check, you may send a check made out to the “Davidson Film Club” to Davidson Film Club, P.O. Box 32, Davidson, NC 28036.
The number of seats in the Armour Street Theatre is limited, and memberships for a given series are accepted on a first come-first served basis, so it is best to subscribe as early as possible to reserve your seat(s) throughout the series.
Thank you in advance for your interest in and support of the screenings at the Davidson Film Club! We continue to exist solely for those reasons!
Alan Singerman, President, Davidson Film Club
[email protected], (704) 231-6736
Schedule for the 21st Series at the Davidson Film Club:
January 21: Audrey Diwan, Happening (France, 2021, 1h40).
An adaptation of Nobel Prize winner Annie Ernaux’s novel of the same name, looking back on her experience with abortion when it was still illegal in France in the 1960s. France, 1963. Anne is a bright young student with a promising future ahead of her, but when she falls pregnant, she sees the opportunity to finish her studies and escape the constraints of her social background disappearing. With her final exams fast approaching and her belly growing, Anne resolves to act, even if she has to confront shame and pain, even if she must risk prison to do so. . .
February 18: Stephen Frears, Dirty Pretty Things (UK, 2002, 1h37).
Okwe is an illegal Nigerian immigrant leading a hard life and struggling to survive in London’s underground. He works as a hotel receptionist at night, and since he has a medical doctor degree, he practices some medicine during the day, albeit in a very odd way. In addition, he must constantly escape from Immigration officers. One day Okwe discovers by chance that an illegal scheme of surgeries is being led by Juan (Señor “Sneaky”), his boss at the hotel. Juan comes up with a tempting proposal: if Okwe agrees to perform the illegal surgeries, he makes a lot of money and gets a U.K. passport. Can Okwe keep his moral values intact?
March 18: Joachim Trier, The Worst Person in the World (Norway, 2021, 2h08).
An achingly human and frighteningly accurate portrait of an entire generation’s existential crisis, The Worst Person in the World observes millennial angst through a young woman’s quest for love and meaning as she enters into her 30s without any idea about her identity and purpose in life. The story is narrated in chapters and covers her four years journey of love and enlightenment in which we see her throw herself into different career paths and new relationships. . .
April 22: Pawo Choyning Dorji, Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom (Buhtan, 2019, 1h50).
A young teacher in modern Bhutan, Ugyen, shirks his duties while planning to go to Australia to become a singer. As a reprimand, his superiors send him to the most remote school in the world, a glacial Himalayan village called Lunana, to complete his service. He finds himself exiled from his Westernized comforts after an arduous 8-day trek just to get there. When he does, he finds no electricity, no textbooks, not even a blackboard. Though poor, the villagers extend a warm welcome to their new teacher, but he faces the daunting task of teaching the village children without any supplies. He wants to quit and go home, but. . .
May 27: Kamila Andini, Before, Now & Then (Indonesia, 2022, 1h43).
The late 1960s Indonesia. Raden Nana Suhani, a gentle, beautiful young Sudanese woman, escapes a violent anti-communist purge in West Java in the 1960s but loses a father, husband, and son to the war. She remarries and begins a new life, but the past lives on in her dreams. Her new husband, a wealthy Sudanese plantation owner, is kind to her, but her place in the home is menial, and he is unfaithful. Nana suffers in silence until the day she meets one of her husband’s mistresses, Ino, and the two women become close friends. Ino is someone she can trust, someone who offers her comfort and to whom she can confide her secrets, past and present. One day, her former husband, thought dead in the war, resurfaces. . .
June 24: Ivaylo Hristov, Fear (Bulgaria, 2020, 1h41).