Capital Celluloid 2014 - Day 102: Sat Apr 12

Bleak Moments (Leigh, 1971): Rio Cinema, 3pm


Welcome to the third Capital Celluloid film screening, another important landmark in the history of the blog at which I hope to see as many of you as possible. I am very please to say that the director Mike Leigh will be at the Rio to introduce the film and then join Sandra Hebron for a Q&A after the screening.

The inspiration for this event came after Leigh's heartfelt piece in the Guardian last year talking about his debut film. 

Chicago Reader review:
Mike Leigh's auspicious first feature focuses on the painful gaps in communication between a lonely accountant's clerk (Anne Raitt) and an uptight schoolteacher she halfheartedly tries to seduce. Kitchen-sink realism with a vengeance, punctuated by painful and awkward silences, this was made before Leigh formed a fully coherent social and political view of his material, but his feeling for the characters never falters. One can find a glancing relationship with John Cassavetes's first feature, Shadows, but the style and milieu is English to the core. This might seem overlong, and the drabness and emotional constipation may drive you slightly batty, but the film leaves a powerful aftertaste.
Jonathan Rosenbaum


Here (and above) is an extract.

'I've tried to vary my films considerably, but I would have to admit that Bleak Moments remains, in some ways, the mother of all Mike Leigh films. And I'm very proud of it.'
Mike Leigh

No comments: