ODEON Cinema
piazza Strozzi 2, tel. 055/295051
The 50 Days of Cinema festival is currently on in Florence. For full cinema listings and information, visit www.50giornidicinema2013.it
The Florence Queer Festival
November 6-12
THE LEGEND OF LEIGH BOWERY
November 7, 3.30pm
Charles Atlas’ (yes!) 2002 documentary about the life and work of the influential Australian performance artist and cultural icon of the 1980s and 1990s. ‘An engrossingly detailed if perhaps inevitably enigmatic portrait of the elusive, outrageous provocateur’ (Variety).
THE HAPPY SAD
November 7, 9pm
Two young couples in New York-one black and gay, one white and heterosexual-find their lives intertwined as they create new relationship norms, explore sexual identity, and redefine monogamy.
INTERIOR. LEATHER BAR
November 7, 10.45pm; November 8, 24.15
A reimagining byJames Franco and Travis Mathews of the 40 minutes of explicit sex cut from “William Friedkin’s “Cruising”. Although the film is full of extreme and other sex acts, Franco’s famous interest in all things taboo results in a frankly tedious and unilluminating spectacle.
STRANGE FRAME
November 8, 5.30pm
This animated lesbian love sci-fi feature, a selection in the Florence Queer Festival, is set in the ‘28th century, 200 years after the Great Earth Exodus. Naia, a feisty, young singer/songwriter, falls in love with the beautiful saxophonist Parker in Ganymede, one of Jupiter’s moons. The two form a band—and now they have to not only make it as musicians but also to fight for their freedom. Dramatically rendered in rich, hand drawn animation, Strange Frame brings us into a world of space pirates, indentured slaves and genetic mutations—infused with music throughout, to create a dreamlike tale unlike anything you’ve ever seen’ (The Director).
BRUNO & EARLENE GO TO VEGAS
November 8, 9pm
A young woman and an intersex teenager develop a friendship that takes them from Los Angeles deep into the Nevada desert. Road movie challenging perceptions of sexuality and identity.
KINK
November 9, 24.15; November 11, 4.45pm
Another James Franco production from Sundance about BDSM and the kink.com fetish porn website. Hard core attempt to demystify the world of hard core production, but really for fetishists only.
TURNING
November 10, 10.45pm
Charles Atlas’ documentary on the 2006 Turning tour of transgender performance work by cult group Antony and the Johnsons.
I AM DIVINE
November 12, 6.30pm
Documentary on how Harris Glenn Milstead became John Waters’s cinematic muse and an icon of vulgar drag camp obesity.
Lo schermo dell’arte Film Festival
November 13-17
SOL LEWITT
November 13-15, 5pm
Centro per l’arte contemporanea Luigi Pecci, Prato
A tribute to the most mystical of conceptual artists centered entirely around his work, his revolutionary creative philosophy, and the profound relationships which tie him to Holland and Italy. Prix du meilleur Portrait at the 31st International Festival of Films on Art.
INSIDE OUT: THE PEOPLE’S ART PROJECT
November 13, 9pm
Part of the Lo schermo dell’arte Film Festival, this fascinating documentary takes a look at the biggest participatory art project in the world: Inside Out by French artist JR, renowned for his giant black-and-white portraits, which have been stuck on walls worldwide. His works are a testament to the communicative power of art and of its social role.
RESTLESS – KEITH HARING IN BRAZIL
November 13, 10.30pm
The restoration of a mural by Keith Haring, created in the 80s in a Brazilian village, turns into an occasion for re-living a significant but little-known moment in the famous American artist’s life. Intimate conversations with his closest friends (such as painter Kenny Scharf), are interspersed with Polaroids and documents from Haring’s collection.
SPAZIO ALFIERI Cinema
Via dell’Ulivo, 6
LES MISÉRABLES
November 13, 9.30pm
A stirring, ambitious but cinematically uneven adaptation of the world’s favourite stage musical from the director of The King’s Speech. Set in early nineteenth-century France, Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables is a timeless story of broken dreams, unrequited love, passion, sacrifice, vengeance and redemption. Unusually for movie musicals, the actors sing their own voices recorded live on set—a feat in itself. ‘Besides being a feast for the eyes and ears, Les Misérables overflows with humor, heartbreak, rousing action and ravishing romance. Damn the imperfections, it’s perfectly marvelous.’ (Rolling Stone). ‘This “Les Mis” does make you feel, intensely and sometimes thrillingly, by honoring the emotional core of its source material’ (Wall Street Journal). ‘Sensitive souls in search of wrenching emotion can be guaranteed their Kleenex moments; you will get wet. But … you will not be cinematically edified. This is a bad movie’ (Time).
LENNONYC
November 20, 9.30pm
This 2010 documentary commemorates the 30th anniversary of John Lennon’s death. The Yoko Ono–driven project takes an intimate look at the lives of Lennon, Yoko Ono and their son, Sean, in New York City during the 1970s. ‘Features never-before-heard studio recordings from the Double Fantasy sessions and never-before-seen outtakes from Lennon in concert and home movies that have only recently been transferred to video. It also features exclusive interviews with Ms. Ono’ (PBS).
BRITISH INSTITUTE of Florence
Lungarno Guicciardini 9
tel. 055/26778270
THE ADVENTURES OF PRISCILLA, QUEEN OF THE DESERT
November 13, 8pm
Three bitchy drag queens get a cabaret gig in Alice Springs and set off in their tour bus, Priscilla, across the desert with assorted (mis)adventures. And a little Abba. ‘It is done well, yet one is still surprised to find it done at all’ (Roger Ebert). ‘Those who find men in feathers inherently divine will have a high old time here, and there are enough hilarious cinematic moments for the gob-smacked rest’ (Empire). ‘Roaringly comic and powerfully affecting road movie’ (Rolling Stone).
ONCE WERE WARRIORS
November 20, 8pm
An Auckland family with Maori warrior descendants is controlled and imperilled by a violent father. The various dysfunctions of the members leave them socially outcast. ‘An emotionally raw, visually stylish first feature, with the intensity of the best social melodrama … A gritty human drama evoking the residual vibrancy of a threatened culture’ (Time Out). ‘In his visceral first feature, Lee Tamahori offers social realism with a savage kick, depicting Maori New Zealanders whose ties to their own history have been destroyed. Left floundering in an inhospitable urban world, they have lost touch with their tribal past to become part of a rootless global subculture. The misery seen here would be familiar anywhere’ (New York Times).
