Season Three - Summer 2015

For the summer season of 2015 we decided to go with the overarching theme of World Cinema. 
Films from suggested themes including: Contemporary European Cinema,  Japanese  anime, Iranian cinema (two films), Greenlandic Cinema, African cinema and Australian cinema.

It truly was a trip around the world.

 I also had some free time on my hands and took the opportunity to design the very first PG Film Club poster. 

Contemporary European Cinema

Two Days, One Night (2014)

Sandra has just been released from the hospital to find that she no longer has a job. According to management, the only way Sandra can hope to regain her position at the factory is to convince her co-workers to sacrifice their much-needed yearly bonuses. Now, over the course of one weekend, Sandra must confront each co-worker individually in order to win a majority of their votes before time runs out. With Two Days, One Night, the Dardennes have turned a relevant social inquiry into a powerful statement on community solidarity, once again delivering a film that is simple on the surface but alive with both compassion and wisdom.

Japanese Cinema (anime) 

Patema Inverted (2013)

A young girl, from a civilization that resides in deep underground tunnels, finds herself trapped in an inverted world and teams up with a resident to escape and return home

Iranian Cinema

A Separation (2011)

Set in contemporary Iran, A Separation is a compelling drama about the dissolution of a marriage. Simin wants to leave Iran with her husband Nader and daughter Termeh. Simin sues for divorce when Nader refuses to leave behind his Alzheimer-suffering father. Her request having failed, Simin returns to her parents' home, but Termeh decides to stay with Nader. When Nader hires a young woman to assist with his father in his wife's absence, he hopes that his life will return to a normal state. However, when he discovers that the new maid has been lying to him, he realizes that there is more on the line than just his marriage.

Persepolis (2007)

Marjane is precocious and outspoken young Iranian girl who was nine years old during the Islamic Revolution. She cleverly outsmarts the "social guardians" and discovers punk, ABBA and Iron Maiden, while living with the terror of government persecution. Then Marjane's journey moves on to Austria where, as a teenager, her parents send her to school.  Marjane returns to Iran to be with her family, putting on the veil and getting married. But at age 24, she realizes that she cannot live in Iran. She then makes the heartbreaking decision to leave her homeland for France, optimistic about her future, shaped indelibly by her past.

Arctic/Greenlandic Cinema 

The Journals of Knud Rasmussen(2006)

A portrayal of the lives of the last great Inuit shaman, Avva, and his beautiful and headstrong daughter, Apak. Based on the journals of 1920s Danish ethnographer Knud Rasmussen.

African Cinema 

Tsotsi  (2006)

A South African hoodlum named Tsotsi lives by a code of violence, and he and his gang of thugs prowl the streets of Johannesburg day and night, attacking those who fail to give them what they want. After casually shooting a woman and stealing her car, he discovers her baby in the back seat. The child acts as a catalyst for the hardened thug to regain his humanity.

 

Australian Cinema

The Proposition 

In 1880s Australia, a lawman (Ray Winstone) offers renegade Charlie Burns (Guy Pearce) a difficult choice. In order to save his younger brother from the gallows, Charlie must hunt down and kill his older brother (Danny Huston), who is wanted for rape and murder. Venturing into one of the Outback's most inhospitable regions, Charlie faces a terrible moral dilemma that can end only in violence.