 | BARBICAN FILM FESTIVALS, SEASONS & SPECIAL EVENTS
· PRACTICAL ELECTRONICA – Friday 25 November
· PREMIERE JAPAN 2011 – New Japanese Cinema – Friday 25 November to Sunday 27 November
· THE AVENGERS – 50TH ANNIVERSARY EVENING – Wednesday 30 November
BARBICAN FILM REGULARS
· MET OPERA LIVE: WAGNER’S SIEGFRIED – Saturday 5 November
· MET OPERA LIVE: GLASS’S SATYAGRAHA – Saturday 19 November
· THE WOLVES (OS LOBOS) with live orchestral performance by Grupo de Música Contemporânea de Lisboa – Silent Film & Live Music Series, Sunday 13 November · BATTALION with live piano accompaniment by Jir Hradil – Silent Film and Live Music Series, Sunday 20 November
· MUR MURS – Architecture on Film Series, Tuesday 29 November
BARBICAN FILM FESTIVALS, SEASONS & SPECIAL EVENTS
PRACTICAL ELECTRONICA (UK, 2011, Dir Ian Helliwell, 59min) – Friday 25 November 5.30pm
This experimental documentary from multi-media artist Ian Helliwell examines early electronic music in Britain – focusing on the work of F C Judd (1914– 1992) and his experiments during the 1950s and 60s with the new sound worlds of musique concrete and electronics. Exploring the little known career of this English musician, inventor and author, the spotlight is on his experimental sound and the amateur tape recording activity of his day, filling in a lost chapter in electronic music history.
Practical Electronica complements Mouse on Mars & André de Ridder with musikFabrik + Oval, an evening of groundbreaking German electronic music, spearheaded by Mouse on Mars’s new orchestral piece Paeanumnion (Barbican Hall, Fri 25 Nov, 8pm).
PREMIERE JAPAN 2011 – Friday 25 November to Sunday 27 November
The best and most recent films to come out of Japan will screen over one weekend at Premiere Japan, which celebrates its seventh consecutive year in London, and its first at the Barbican. The diverse programme will include Q&As, free workshops and more. Full programme to be announced mid October.
Premiere Japan 2011 is presented by the Embassy of Japan, with kind support from the Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation.
THE AVENGERS – 50TH ANNIVERSARY EVENING – Wednesday 30 November 7pm + Q&A with Gerry O’Hara and Roger Marshall A rare opportunity to see the classic ‘60s television series The Avengers on the big screen followed by a Q&A with cast and crew from the series including director Gerry O’Hara and scriptwriter Roger Marshall.
Premiering on UK television screens in January 1961, The Avengers remained in production until March 1969, and made household names of stars Honor Blackman, Diana Rigg, Linda Thorson and Patrick Macnee. This celebration of the 50th anniversary of the cult series includes standout episodes Man With Two Shadows (1963) and The Hour That Never Was (1965).
Curated and hosted by Jaz Wiseman.
BARBICAN FILM REGULARS
MET OPERA LIVE: During November, the Barbican hosts two of the New York Met’s award-winning series of live, high-definition performance transmissions:
WAGNER’S SIEGFRIED – Saturday 5 November 4pm
In part three of The Ring, this new production of Wagner’s cosmic vision focuses on his hero’s early conquests, while Robert Lepage’s revolutionary stage machine transforms itself from bewitched forest to mountaintop love nest. Gary Lehman sings the title role and Deborah Voigt’s Brünnhilde is his prize. Bryn Terfel is the Wanderer, James Levine conducts.
GLASS’ SATYAGRAHA – Saturday 19 November 6pm
The Met’s visually extravagant production is back for an encore. Richard Croft returns as Gandhi in Philip Glass’s unforgettable opera, which the Washington Post calls “a profound and beautiful work of theater.”
Silent Film & Live Music Series, Sunday 13 November 4pm
THE WOLVES (OS LOBOS) (UK Premiere) ( Portugal, 1923, Dir. Rino Lupo, 83min)
One of the most captivating films of the Portuguese silent era, Os Lobos is based on an acclaimed play by Francisco Lage and João de Oliveira. Shot entirely on location (remarkable for a film of this period), the wild landscape provides a fitting backdrop for this tale of violent passion and desire. This UK premiere will be accompanied by live music composed by Luis Soldado, conducted by Maestro Rui Pinheiro, and performed by Grupo de Música Contemporânea de Lisboa.
Part of the 2nd UK Portuguese Film Festival, curated by Filmville. With special thanks to Instituto Camões in Portugal, Cinemateca Portuguesa and the Portuguese Embassy in London.
Silent Film and Live Music Series, Sunday 20 November 4pm
BATTALION ( Czechoslovakia, 1927, Dir. Premysl Prazsky, 75min) – With live piano accompaniment by Jiri Hradil, a member of Lesnizver and Tate Bojs.
The Barbican continues its exploration of European silent cinema with Battalion, one of the gems of the Czech silent era. Based on a much-loved novel and play, the story follows the fortunes of a real-life reluctant hero who took on the legal system. Popular Czech singer, actor and composer Karel Hasler stars as a disillusioned lawyer who swaps his home for the ill-famed pub ‘Battalion’ after he catches his wife with her lover. Living among the poor and drop-outs of Prague he becomes their patron, and when one of them is shot during a police raid, he stands as a key witness in the trial. Raw and effective, director Prazsky imbued his fourteenth film with an intellectual and emotional depth exceptional for its time.
Architecture on Film Series, Tuesday 29 November, 7pm
MUR MURS ( France/US, 1981, Dir. Agn è s Varda, 81min) + GET OUT OF THE CAR (US, 2010, Dir Tom Andersen, 34 min)
The Grande Dame of the French New Wave Agnès Varda turns her lens on the murals of Los Angeles, the cultures they stem from and their eclectic bunch of Angeleno creators. From Afro-Futurism in Watts to utopic psychedelia in Venice Beach, Varda surveys the iconic and the cockamamy, the commercial and the communal, mixing her own unique dose of poetics into this valuable cinematic document of aesthetics, politics and civic history – as homespun urban backdrops rub shoulders with the epicentre of the movie industry.
+ Get Out of the Car
Andersen’s follow up to the celebrated Los Angeles Plays Itself is a tribute to the beaten roadside signs and community murals of L.A, the city’s lost and hidden histories, and the absence of signs where they should exist. Composing these transient billboards and façade’s into an ambient collage of the city, a soundtrack of local music, residents’ voiceovers and Anderson’s own narration accompanies this singular close-up homage to L.A, from the master of the essay film.
In English and Spanish without subtitles
Notes to editors:
Ticket prices:
barbican.org.uk/film Box Office: 0845 120 7527
Standard: £10.50 / £9.50 online
Members: £8.50 / £7.50 online
Concessions: £8.50
Under 15: £6.00
Monday Madness: all new release tickets £5.00 online
Underground Tickets: £15 / 20 / 25 / 30
* Local Classification
# Certificate to be confirmed
For further information contact:
Sarah Harvey Publicity, 020 7232 2812
Sarah Harvey sarah@sarahharvey.info
Liz Parkinson liz@sarahharvey.info
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