This evening the 8th annual Glasgow Film Festival programme was announced a packed programme of premier's ,special guests and plenty of unique events to keep February a film packed month for the city as well as film fans visiting the city during the month too. As The Glasgow Film Festival also marks the first major event in the Year of Creative Scotland and will take place in sixteen venues in and around Glasgow city between 16- 26 February.
This year's Gala opening will be coming directly from Sundance Film Festival(opening tomorrow) Lynn Shelton's (Humpday) Your Sister's Sister a romantic comedy starring Emily Blunt, Mark Duplass a captivating tale of broken hearts and healing of love. Variety have Shelton as one of the directors to watch out for this year with Your Sister's Sister been compared to films similar to Woody Allen. Closing film this year will be Cannes 2011 Prix Louis Delluc winning film Le Havre from Finnish filmmaker Aki Kaurismaki the deadpan comedy of a shoeshiner who befriends a young African immigrant on the run from the authorities. The film was on the shortlist for best foreign film at next month's Oscars, sadly today along with shock exclusion Zhang Zimou's Flowers Of War, though despite the disapointment of missing the nomination's list actually been on the shortlist is proof of the quality of the film.
This year's festival will see 239 films as well as events taking place next month including a record number of UK Premier and European premier's. Among the highlights are the first British screening of Irvine Welsh's long awaited Ecstasy , Twilight fans eager to see more of R-Pattz will be able to see him in Scottish premier of Bel Ami. Noomi Rapace proving how versatile she is, in the gripping psychological thriller Babycall. If epic films are your thing Jean Jacques Annaud's Black Gold (trailer here). Polish Oscar Nominee for Best Film In Darkness by veteran filmmaker Agnieska Holand a epic wartime tale of a Catholic sewer worker who gives refuge to fleeing Jews during Nazi Occupied Poland despite his anti semite views. Emily Blunt will make her second appearance at the festival with the UK Premier of her romantic drama Salmon Fishing In Yemen with Ewan McGregor. Paolo Sorrentino's This Must Be The Place starring Sean Penn looking like a Robert Smith (The Cure) on track of the ss guard whom his ill father has held a grudge against all these years.
It's not just the feature films, documentaries play a big part of the festival and this year's line up probably one of the strongest in the festival's history.Buck a film about the inspiration behind The Horse Whisperer Buck Brannaman. Roger Corman the king of low budget exploitation films doc Corman's World: Exploits of A Hollywood Rebel makes its Scottish premier at Frightfest strand, last year's best Sxsw doc Dragonslayer arrives for a stint at Youth Festival as does Being Elmo a heart warming tale of Kevin Clash his aspirations of been a puppeteer to becoming Sesame Street's Elmo puppeteer this one wont leave a dry eye in the house! Afestival wouldn't be a festival without a Werner Herzog film and his study into the human cost of crime Into The Abyss will make an appearance.
Before the main part of the festival 2 important others parts of The Glasgow Film Festival will take place with Short Film Festival (9-12 February) showcasing the best of local, national and international short films, which we know is the life blood for future feature film makers.Before that festival we have the Youth Film Festival (5-15 February) which has a great programme on offer the youth populous with the Scottish premier of The Muppets and Scottish premier of indie Terri starring John C Reilly.
Last year we had a new international strand promoting the best in Bollywood Cinema this year we have Welcome To Germany showcasing some of the best films from the nation. Mark Millar returns with a great comic related strand in Kapow! a diverse range of great related films & documentaries from the classics of Superman, Flash Gordon, The Crow to Tatsumi .A fantastic doc which is an illustrated autobiographical story of manga artist Yoshihiro Tatsumi the father of Gekiga(dramatic pictures) a film recently released cinematic ally but sadly not Scotland. Pack your umbrella and its time to singing and dancing in the rain for this year's retrospective which is to Gene Kelly a salute to one of Hollywood's finest with a selection of his greatest films from the magical Singing In The Rain, American In Paris to Brigadoon. The ultimate strand happens on the final weekend when the Frightfest boys head north for a weekend of the best of horror, thrillers enough to make your creep fresh and wish you had clean underwear with you. We brought you the programme earlier today with the highlights been The Raid see it before Hollywood destroys it's integrity with a remake.
As you can see I would be going on all night if I told you about the great things this year's festival has to offer, there' s something for everyone and we'll do our best to cover as much as the festival psychically possible. Now that the press launch has gone the most important date before the release is January 19th, tomorrow from midnight when the tickets and programme will be available to the general public at www.glasgowfilm.org/festival or by phone at (00)44 141 332 6535 or visit the GFT Box Office from the morning at 12 Rose Street, Glasgow . Remember to say we sent you!
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