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The Oswestry Film Society programme will appear on this site once films are scheduled. Keep checking back to find out what's being screened and when, and please come out and support us.
Thank you to our former long-term hosts in Oswestry, the Kinokulture cinema. We are now based just round the corner at the Hermon Chapel Arts Centre. You can check out their own varied range of music and arts events at their separate website, www.hermon-arts.org.uk
Wed 18th Dec 2024, 7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel.
Finding Your Feet (12A) - 110 mins
Led by a charming pairing of Imelda Staunton and Celia Imrie, this British retiree rom-com (with a warm side-order of death and dementia!) is by turns a film with happiness, sadness, joy and disappointment.
Staunton and Imrie lead as long-estranged sisters Sandra and Bif. When Sandra, a suburban toff, surprises her husband mid-clinch with his mistress, she grabs her fancy luggage and lands at the door of bohemian Bif’s cluttered council flat. Within days, Sandra is joining Bif’s dance class, smoking her weed and making eyes at a two-stepping retiree named Charlie (the wonderful Timothy Spall).
Spall and Staunton in particular are tremendous. Her girlish pleasure when she rediscovers her joy in dancing lights up her face from the inside; his quiet grief, as he realises that his cherished visits to his dementia-stricken wife are causing her confusion and pain, is heart-wrenching.
Watch out too for a gloriously vampy Joanna Lumley.
This is a great film about growing older and learning to enjoy it - and is perfect for our Christmas movie night.
Wed 8th Jan 2025,
7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel
Wilding (PG), ENCORE SCREENING - 78mins film, + 26 mins recorded Q&A
AFTER SELLING OUT 'WILDING' LATE LAST YEAR, WE'RE DELIGHTED TO START THE OSWESTRY FILM SOCIETY'S 2025 PROGRAMME WITH A MUCH-REQUESTED SECOND SCREENING.
Based on Isabella Tree's best selling book of the same title, Wilding tells the incredible story of a couple who bet on nature for the future of their failing 400 year old estate.
The film follows them as they set to work with a ground breaking vision, battling entrenched tradition and major forces along the way, daring to place the fate of their farm into the hands of nature.
Ripping down fences, they set the land back to the wild and entrust its recovery to a motley mix of animals both tame and wild.
It is the beginning of a grand project that will become one of the most significant experiments in Europe.
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Director David Allen.
Run time 78 minutes.
Post-film: Recorded Q&A with Isabella Tree and Craig Bennett (CEO, Wildlife Trust) - courtesy of Met Film.
Wed Jan 15th 2025, 7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel
Our Kind Of Traitor (15) - 108 mins
This sophisticated twisting thriller from master spy-teller John le Carre sees a British couple holidaying in Morocco sucked into a former Russian mafia money-man (the excellent Stellan Skarsgård)'s attempts to escape from his bosses who want him dead - his only hope is to ask the unsuspecting Brits to broker him sanctuary with the UK intelligence services, in return for exposing a vein of corruption that runs right to the heart of the City of London. The stakes grow increasingly higher as Ewan McGregor and Naomi Harris - perfect Le Carre innocents caught up in a web of deceit - are forced on the run across Europe as the might of the Russian mafia closes in. With beautiful cinematography, the suspense is built relentlessly, keeping you guessing as to who is what...
Wed 22nd Jan 2025,
7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel.
Ama Gloria (12A) - 84mins
Cléo (an exceptional performance by six-year-old Louise Mauroy-Panzani) loves her nanny Gloria (Ilça Moreno Zego) more than anything. When Gloria suddenly has to return home to Cape Verde to look after her own children, Gloria invites Cléo to visit her and the two have to make the most of their last summer together.
Marie Amachoukeli’s outstanding feature was the opening film of Cannes Critics’ Week 2023 and has been an audience favourite at film festivals across Europe including London and Dublin. It is produced by Céline Sciamma’s regular producer Bénédicte Couvreur (Petite Maman, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Girlhood).
French (subtitled)
Wed Jan 29th, 2025
7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel
Fantastic Fungi (15) -81 mins
Imagine an organism that feeds you, heals you, reveals secrets of the universe and could help save the planet. Fantastic Fungi is a revelatory time-lapse journey that takes you on an immersive journey into the amazing underground network beneath your feet. Stunning cinematography helps us investigate the magical, mysterious and medicinal world of the fungi kingdom and its power to sustain and contribute to the environmental challenges facing life on Earth. With its spectacular footage of growth and decay, and impassioned commentaries about the real magic of mushrooms, this documentary is a treat for the eye and the ear.
We will also be holding a short Q&A with the founders of Shrooma, Oswestry's new mushroom-growing and research centre.
Wed 5th Feb 2025,
7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel
Sightseers (15), 88 mins
​Superb example of British dark humour – a delightful story written by and starring Alice Lowe and Steve Oram as a new dorky couple Chris and Tina who take off for a long holiday tour across the countryside. These two are perfect foils; they play deftly off each other in a quietly crashing-into-funny way. Chris has a short fuse for every-day annoyances: you see a guy littering, you run him over with your caravan! Is Tina – repressed by her domineering mother – up for the ride? This is Natural Born Killers meets the Ramblers Association on a caravan tour of carnage. Quirky British black humour at its best - brilliantly written and full of character.
Wed Feb 12th, 2025
7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel
The Outrun (15) -118 mins
The Outrun is a brutally honest drama about addiction and recovery, strength and survival, mental health and the ability of the sea, the land and of people to restore life and renew hope.
After a decade away in London, 29-year-old Rona returns home to the Orkney Islands. Sober but lonely, she tries to suppress her memory of the events which set her on this journey of recovery. Slowly the mystical land enters her inner world and - one day at a time - Rona finds hope and strength in herself among the heavy gales and the bracingly cold sea.
The film stars four-time Oscar-nominee Saoirse Ronan, alongside Paapa Essiedu, Saskia Reeves and Stephen Dillane, and was highly rated at this year's Edinburgh Film Festival. It's directed by Nora Fingscheidt from a screenplay written jointly by her and Amy Liptrot.
Wed 19th Feb 2025,
7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel
Millions (12A) - 94 mins
The UK is about to switch its currency to the euro when a gang robs a train loaded with pounds on their way to incineration. One of the big cash bags is thrown off the train by a Ronnie Biggs-ish villain, and by chance it falls into the lap of seven year old Damian. He and his brother have only a few days to spend their windfall before it all becomes worthless bits of paper.
Damian wants to use the money for good causes. His brother is rather more materialistic.
Damian then starts seeing what the world and the people around him are made of.
And beware the bad guy (Christopher Fulford) who’s now skulking about the neighbourhood looking for his missing loot.
Directed by the talented Danny Boyle, ethics and being human come to the fore in this uplifting, tender, emotional and inspirational cross-generational mix of comedy and drama.
Wed 11th Dec 2024, 7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel.
Thelma (12A) - 97 mins - THIS IS A PAST EVENT
A funny and endearing pastiche to stunt-fuelled action cinema. Thelma Post is a senior grandmother who loses $10,000 to a con artist pretending to be her grandson on the phone. Actually aged 94, actress June Squibb gives an excellent performance as the tough Thelma, riding across town on a mobility scooter borrowed from her gentleman admirer, played by the late Richard Roundtree.
Tom Cruse himself is an indirect inspiration for the lead character - Squibb insisted on performing most of her own stunts!
Wholesome comedy at its best.
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Wed Dec 4th, 2024
7.30pm, at Hermon Chapel
A Royal Night Out (12A) - 97 mins - THIS IS A PAST EVENT
On V.E. Day in 1945, as peace extends across Europe, the Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret are allowed out to join the celebrations. It is a night full of excitement, danger, and the first flutters of romance.
A Royal Night Out is a real treat - a little fantasy inspired by that true story.
Margaret is the first to slip away from her escort. She's befriended by a Royal Naval officer seeking to take advantage of what he believes is just an ordinary girl, and is led into a world of nightclubs, gambling and spiked drinks.
Elizabeth and working-class Jack are thrown together by chance, and have to make their way through London on this crazy, unbelievable night. And they've both got secrets.
In her actual diary, the future Queen Elizabeth wrote: "Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly, Pall Mall, walked simply miles. Ate, partied, bed 3am!"
This romantic comedy adventure is a nostalgic British affair - and a bit of rollicking fun!