FILM LIST

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NOW SHOWING LITTLE

DORRIT (U)

Showing: Fri 1pm (Part I), 4.30pm (Part I), 8pm (Part I); Sat 1pm (Part II), 4.30pm (Part I), 8pm (Part 11); Sun 5pm (Part 1),

8.10pm (Part II); Mon 1pm (Part I), 4.30pm (Part 11), 8pm (Part I); Tue 1pm (Part II), 4.30pm (Part I), 8pm (Part II); Wed 1pm

(Part 1), 4.30pm (Part 11), 8pm (Part I); Thurs 1pm (Part 11), 4.30pm (Part I), 8pm (Part II).

O gum/(1y 7/ laliném

Sun 24 at2.30pm THE TIN DRUM (18)

Sun 31 at 1.30pm THEORUM (15) & DEDIPUS REX (15)

0 Late wig/ll s

Fri223t11.15pm THE BIG CHILL(18)& JAGGEDEDGEUM

Sat23at 11.15pm STRAW DOGS (18) & THE I NIGHT PORTER (18)

Fri 29 at 1 1 .15pm WITNESS (15) & CHINATOWN (18)

Sat30at11.15pm DUNE (PG) & BARBARELLA (15)

Starts Friday 5 Feb: MAURICE

Little Dorrit (U) (Christine Edzard, UK, 1987) Alec Guinness, Derek Jacobi, Sarah Pickering. 176 mins (Part I); 181 mins (Part II). Six hours of Dickens might sound like a gentle form of torture: punishment meted out to an Eng Lit student for skimping on chapter 23. In fact, aftertwo three hour session's of Christine Edzard’s Little Dorrit, lwas ready fora third, orwould at least quite happily have sat through the first again.

Edzard takes Dicken’s huge complex novel about the grim social duplicity of his contemporary London and cuts and shapes it sympathetically for film. Focusing, helpfully, on the central story of the growing relationship between the upright Arthur Clennam and Little Dorrit, born in the debtors' prison, she yet manages to convey the

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I Brazil I 15) (Terry Gilliam. UK. 1985) Jonathan Pryce. Robert De Niro. Michael Palin. 14?. mins. Ambitious. dazzling ()rwellian fantasy with Pryce as a cog in the bureaucratic wheel taking on the system for the power of love. Glasgow; Grosvenor

I Cal ( 15)(Pat ()‘Connor. UK. 198-1) Helen Mirren. John Lynch. 1(12mins. Impossible love in sectarian Ireland with an award-winning performance of uncharacteristic warmth from Mirren. lidinburgh; Filmhouse

I Catch 22 ( 18) (Mike Nichols. L'S. 197(1) Alan Arkin. Martin Balsam. Richard Benjamin. ()rson Welles. 122 mins. Blackly comic misadventures on a US Air Force base in the Med during World War One. Fair attempt at capturingthe characters and events from Heller's classic novel. and A rkin is a splendid Yossarian. but the careering manic wit of the book‘s firecracker prose seems somehow missing in this respectful screen translation. Edinburgh; filIFS

I César (PG) (Marcel Pagnol. France. 1933) Raimu. Pierre Fresnay. Charpin. 120 mins. Conclusion of the Marseilles trilogy in which Fanny‘s grown son learns the truth about his father‘s real identity. Edinburgh; Filmhouse

I The Chant ofJimmie Blacksmith ( 18) (Fred Schepisi. Australia. 1978)Tommy Lewis. Ray Barrett. Jack Thompson. 122 mins. A powerful. anti-racist statement. one of Schepisi‘s best films. tellsof Aborigine half-caste Lewis‘s tragic plight as he is caught between two worlds in turn-of-the-century Australia. Helpful antidote to the current bonhomie ofthe bi-centenary celebrations. Glasgow; GFI" I Chinatown ( 18) (Roman Polanski. US.

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scope, detail and changing perspectives of the original partly by dividing the story into two, telling it first from Arthur’s point of view (Nobody's Fault) and then from Little Dorrit’s (Little Dorrit‘s Story). Don’t worry, this isn’t boring in fact, it is fascinating and helps convey the richness of Dickens’ narrative style. Clennam returns from India and becomes intrigued by Little Dorrit, his mother’s seamstress. Drawn into her story, he resolves to help her family, who have fallen on hard times and long been ensconsed in the debtors' prison. As he moves between the several separate worlds of London, a vivid, scathing picture is gradually woven of scandalous landlords, impenetrable and inefficient bureaucracy and parasitic wealth. Little Dorrit's life in

1974) Jack Nicholson. Faye Dunaway. John Huston. 131 mins. Private eyeJake Gittes takes on a routine casein 1937 LA and ends up uncovering more than he had bargained for in this dark thriller with a handsome period atmosphere and a superlative cast. Edinburgh; Cameo I The Color of Money ( 15) (Martin Scorsese. US. 1986) Paul Newmanfl‘om Cruise. Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio. 119 mins. Generally satisfactory iftardy sequel to The Hustler with Newman's immaculater played Fast Eddie Felson finding redemption through his initially cynical and exploitative involvement with young pool hotshot Cruise. Edinburgh; EUFS I Come And See ( 15) (Iilem Mlimov. USSR. 1985) Alexi Kravchenko. ()lga Mironova. 142 mins. Byelorussian. near the Polish border. 19-13. Two teenagers attempt to survive on the run from the Nazi troops who have destroyed their village and exterminated the vast majority ofits inhabitants. 1larrowingre-creation of wartime atrocities. a remarkable blend ofoccasionally stylised incidents and camerawork with a chilling attention to the most disturbing aspects of documentary detail. The result is quite overwhelming. Edinburgh; EUFS I Le Cop (Les Ripmu') ( 15) (Claude Zidi. Frnace. 198-1) Philippe Noiret. Thierry Lhermitte. Regine. 107 mins. Noiret and Lhermitte star as an Odd Couple on the beat; the former a street-smart veteran who has a carefully arranged lifestyle whereby he never pays cash for anything. the latter an idealistic incorruptible rookie who vows that there is no such thing asa ‘frce‘ meal.

Sly. anarchic and cheerfully amoral flic comedy. Highly recommended. Strathclyde; Haldane Film Society

the prison soon seems to have more integrity than that of the social world that put her there. It is a two-nation society-the parallels with Britain today are startling, even down to the Crash.

The film is packed with fine performances of characters trapped within social confines and those of their own making. Derek Jacobi as Arthur Clennam makes a wonderful bewildered and gentle soul gradually coming to his feet and escaping his personal emotional prison; Sarah Pickering’s Little Dorrit is enigmatic, reserved, and possessed of a will of iron, and Alec Guinness makes of Dorrit, her self-centred father, a sad, yet constantly ambivalent figure, for whom one gradually loses sympathy. There are delightful, unsettling comic cameo performances from Miriam Margolyes as the slightly unhinged, sentimental lady from Arthur's past, Joan Greenwood as his sternly repressive mother, imprisoned in her own straitjacket of resentment, and Max Wall as her ancient manservant. Juicy comic grotesques are scattered among the bureacratic and social powers that be, reflecting Dickens’ blend of fantasy and realism, and the film moves from pain to comedy skilfully.

This is a classic film in its own right that also pays testimony to Dickens’ sharp social documentation and unshakeable ability to tell a good story. And there isn’t even one all-singing all-dancing number. (Sarah Hemming)

I Cry Freedom (PG) (Richard Attenborough. US. 1987) Denzel Washington. Kevin Kline. Penelope Wilton. 158 mins. Although not without its faults. Attenborough's biographical recreation of the friendship between black civil rights activist Steve Biko and white liberal newspaperman Donald Woods is his best film to date; a powerful and moving drama that also stands as a vigorous condemnation of the obscenity of apartheid. Glasgow; Cannon Sauchiehall Street. Edinburgh; Cannon

I Les Dames Du Bois De Boulogne (PG) (Robert Bresson. France. 1946) Maria Casares. Elina Labourdette. Lucienne Bogaert. 91) mins. A young woman gains revenge on her bored lover by arranging for him to marry a prostitute. Interesting collaboration between Bresson and Jean Cocteau Edinburgh; EUFS

I The Dead (U) (John Huston, UK/W. Germany. 1987) Anjelica Huston. Donal McCann, Helena Carroll. 83 mins. Huston's final film is a superb adaptation of the Joyce Dub/inns short story. Set during a traditional festive celebration in Dublin, its skill and perception draws you into another world where the dinner conversation and general merriment reveals universal truths about death and the beauty of love. Glasgow; GFI‘

I Les Demieres Vacances (Roger Lcenhardt. France, 1948) Berthe Bovy, Renee Devillers, Pierre Dux. An evocation of adolescent love, set in a family‘s summer retreat put up for sale by its inheritors. Glasgow; French Cine-Club I Dersu Uzala (U) (Akira Kurosawa, USSR/Japan. 1975) Maxim Muzuk. Adventures in the barren wastes ofthe Russian Steppes with a solitary fur trapper. Stirring late Kurosawa exploration of familiar

10 The List 22 Jan 4 Feb 1988